Evolving the 3-O/6-O regiospecificity of a microbial glycosyltransferase for efficient production of ginsenoside Rh1 and unnatural ginsenoside

Glycosyltransferase is a popular and promising enzyme to produce high-value-added natural products. Rare ginsenoside Rh1 and unnatural ginsenoside 3β-O-Glc-PPT are promising candidates for drugs. Herein, a microbial glycosyltransferase UGTBL1 was able to catalyze the protopanaxatriol (PPT) 3-O/6-O-glycosylation with poor 6-O-regiospecificity. A structure-guided strategy of mutations involving loop engineering, PSPG motif evolution, and access tunnels engineering was proposed to engineer the enzyme. The variant I62R/M320H/P321Y/N170A from the protein engineering achieved a great improvement of 6-O regioselectivity which increased from 10.98 % (WT) to 96.26 % and a booming conversion of 95.57 % for ginsenoside Rh1. A single mutant M320W showed an improved 3-O regioselectivity of 84.83 % and an increased conversion of 98.13 % for the 3β-O-glc-PPT product. Molecular docking and molecular dynamics (MD) simulations were performed to elucidate the possible molecular basis of the regiospecificity and catalytic activity. The unprecedented high titer of ginsenoside Rh1 (20.48 g/L) and 3β-O-Glc-PPT (18.04 g/L) was attained with high regioselectivity using fed-batch cascade reactions from UDPG recycle, which was the highest yield reported to date. This work could provide an efficient and cost-effective approach to the valuable ginsenosides.