A New Screening Method for C-P Compound Producing Organisms by the Use of Phosphoenolpyruvate Phosphomutase

Phosphoenolpyruvate phosphomutase (PEPPM) catalyzes the C-P bond forming reaction by intramolecular rearrangement of phosphoenolpyruvate to phosphonopyruvate, and shows stronger activity in catalyzing the reverse reaction than the forward reaction. By exploiting the activity of PEPPM to catalyze the reverse reaction, 81 strains were screened as possible C-P compound producing microorganisms from 230 soil samples. Two of these strains, B-1 and L-b, were found to produce C-P compounds by ³¹P-NMR spectral analysis of their broth filtrates. The activity of PEPPM was detected in the cell extracts of these two strains. The strain B-1 was identified as Pseudomonas gladioli, and hydroxyethylphosphonic acid (HEP) was isolated from the broth filtrate of this strain as a C-P compound.