Mimicry of a Non-ribosomally Produced Antimicrobial, Brevicidine, by Ribosomal Synthesis and Post-translational Modification

Zhao et al. describe a strategy to synthesize mimics of the recently discovered antimicrobial non-ribosomal peptide, brevicidine. The engineered mimics show antimicrobial activities against pathogens susceptible to brevicidine, which demonstrate that conversion of NRPs to RiPPs is feasible and offer great opportunities for engineering a wide range of effective antibiotics.