| Summary: | Includes bibliographical references. === As part of an antibiotic-screening programme, an actinomycete, Streptomyces polyantibioticus SPRT, was isolated from soil collected from the banks of the Umgeni River, KwaZulu-Natal Province, South Africa. It exhibited antibiosis against M. tuberculosis H37RvT, prompting interest in its antibiotic production. An antibiotic produced by S. polyantibioticus SPRT was isolated and its structure determined by nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) and X-ray crystallography to be 2,5- diphenyloxazole (DPO). Of great interest is the independent confirmation of the antibiotic activity of DPO and extension of the data to show activity against non-replicating persistent cells of M. tuberculosis. It seems likely that 2,5-DPO is synthesized non-ribosomally by S. polyantibioticus SPRT. It is proposed that DPO is synthesised from the starting units of benzoic acid and -hydroxyphenylalanine or phenylalanine, undergoing peptide bond formation followed by cyclization and decarboxylation to form DPO.
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