One-pot chemoenzymatic preparation of coenzyme A analogues

A rapid and stoichiometric method for the synthesis of analogues of coenzyme A is described. The method links the enzymes pantothenate kinase, phosphopantotheine adenylyltransferase, and dephosphocoenzyme A kinase in vitro to generate a variety of CoA analogues from chemically synthesized pantothenic acid derivatives. The Escherichia coli CoA biosynthetic enzymes were overexpressed as hexa-histidine-tagged proteins, providing an abundant source of pure active catalysts for the reaction. The synthesis of five novel CoA derivatives is reported and the method is shown to be robust and tolerant of a number of different pantothenic acid structures, which indicates that the procedure should be widely applicable.