Abstract
In spite of their extraordinary structural variety and complexity all mevalonoids derive from one simple C6 compound, (R)-mevalonic acid (1). This was discovered (34) by Folkers and his colleagues in 19 56 in dried distillers’ solubles and shown to replace acetate as a growth factor for Lactobacillus acidophilus. In the same year Tavormina, also at the Merck laboratories, found (32) that racemic mevalonic acid was efficiently (43.4%) incoporated into cholesterol by rat liver homogenates. Thereafter, mevalonic acid was rapidly recognized as the progenitor of the “biogenetic isoprene unit,” isopentenyl pyrophosphate, and hence of all mevalonoids. Our most detailed knowledge of terpenoid biosynthesis comes from studies with rat liver systems. This includes the superb work of Cornforth, Popjak and their colleagues (11), which established in complete stereochemical detail the formation of squalene, lanosterol and cholesterol. Beyond this, the most fruitful studies to date of mevalonoid biosynthesis have been carried out with fungal metabolites. Verrucarol (2), gibberellic acid (3) and ophiobolin A (4) provide three examples of fungal terpenoids of complex and contrasting structural types whose biosynthesis has been studied in detail (2, 12, 9).
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Overton, K.H. (1977). Biosynthesis of Mevalonoid-Derived Compounds in Cell Cultures. In: Barz, W., Reinhard, E., Zenk, M.H. (eds) Plant Tissue Culture and Its Bio-technological Application. Proceedings in Life Sciences. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-66646-9_6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-66646-9_6
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