Nature Biotechnology pp 848 - 855

Researchers in Japan have conjured up a new type of fungus that produces novel chemicals for fighting the tiny worms that invade the roots of crops. Although worms may be a mere inconvenience to pet owners, infestations in crops like bananas, soybeans and sugarbeet cost millions of dollars of damage each year. Because of the poor efficiency of existing conventional chemical methods in producing new derivatives of existing worm-killing natural products, a need exists for new approaches to produce worm-fighting compounds.

In the July issue of Nature Biotechnology, Koji Yanai and his colleagues tackled this problem by generating a strain of the fungus Rosellinia that produces exotic derivatives of its endogenous worm-killing chemical. They accomplish this by removing one of the fungus' endogenous enzymes and introducing three enzymes borrowed from an antibiotic-producing bacterium, Streptomyces venezuelae.

The resulting natural product derivatives represent a starting point for the search for new agents capable of fighting worm infestations of crops. The work also illustrates the power of genetic engineering to combine the biosynthetic strengths of distantly related microorganisms and to circumvent conventional chemical approaches that often produce byproducts harmful to the environment.