UDP-N-acetylglucosamine enolpyruvyl transferase from Pseudomonas aeruginosa

Potential Inhibitors Targeting Escherichia coli UDP-N-Acetylglucosamine Enolpyruvyl Transferase (MurA): An Overview

Antibiotic resistance is one of the biggest challenges that is escalating and affecting humanity across the globe. To overcome this increasing burden of resistance, discovering novel hits by targeting the enzymes involved in peptidoglycan (murein) biosynthesis has always been considered better in antimicrobial drug discovery. UDP-N-acetylglucosamine enolpyruvyl transferase (MurA) enzyme has been identified as essential for Escherichia coli survival and catalyzes the early-stage step in bacterial cell wall synthesis. The present article gives a brief overview of the role of enzymes in peptidoglycan synthesis and MurA enzyme (previously known as MurZ in E. coli), in particular, including its structural and active site features. This review also provides an insight into the current knowledge of the reported MurA inhibitors, their mechanism of action and drawbacks of these hits that hinder their clinical trials, which would be helpful for synthesis and discovering potent molecules.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s12088-021-00988-6.

UDP-N-acetylglucosamine enolpyruvyl transferase as a potential target for antibacterial chemotherapy: recent developments

The emergence of antibiotic resistance in bacterial pathogens has foxed the health organizations which are actively scrambling for solutions. The available data indicate an increased morbidity in infections often leading to mortality among patients where drug-resistant pathogens have negated the effect of the medicines. In the context of developing "novel bacterial inhibitors" for killing or arresting the growth of drug-resistant pathogens, UDP-N-acetylglucosamine enolpyruvyl transferase (MurA) is an enzyme that provides hope for the future. This enzyme catalyzes the first committed step in the biosynthesis of peptidoglycan, an integral and essential component of the bacterial cell wall. MurA enzyme is neither present nor required by mammals and shows poor homology with human proteins. Therefore, it is an ideal target for antibacterial chemotherapy. Till date, 18 structures of MurA (in native and ligand-bound forms) from different bacterial pathogens have been solved. In the last 2 years, eight structures of bacterial MurA have been submitted to the Protein Data Bank and many inhibitors discovered. The present review discusses the structural and functional features of MurA of bacterial pathogens along with the development of MurA-targeted inhibitors.