Kynureninase project - functionality of the key kynureninase (KynU), which catalyses kynurenine to anthranilic acid (AA), in oral bacteria

The kynurenine (KYN) pathway produces key metabolites for immunoregulation and neuromodulation in humans, but its presence and activity in the oral microbiome are unclear. This study investigates the functionality of the key kynureninase (KynU), which catalyses kynurenine to anthranilic acid (AA), in oral bacteria.The brief methods included bioinformatic analysis to identify putative <i>kynU</i> genes in oral bacterial genomes, and structural similarity of the predicted proteins was evaluated using Template Modeling (TM)-score and Root Mean Square Deviation (RMSD) analyses. Selected <i>kynU</i> sequences were cloned into the pBAD-His A expression vector. Enzymatic activity was accessed by quantifying AA concentrations using liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry (LC-MS).