Abstract

Psilocybin is the psychotropic tryptamine‐derived natural product of Psilocybe carpophores, the so‐called “magic mushrooms”. Although its structure has been known for 60 years, the enzymatic basis of its biosynthesis has remained obscure. We characterized four psilocybin biosynthesis enzymes, namely i) PsiD, which represents a new class of fungal l‐tryptophan decarboxylases, ii) PsiK, which catalyzes the phosphotransfer step, iii) the methyltransferase PsiM, catalyzing iterative N‐methyl transfer as the terminal biosynthetic step, and iv) PsiH, a monooxygenase. In a combined PsiD/PsiK/PsiM reaction, psilocybin was synthesized enzymatically in a step‐economic route from 4‐hydroxy‐l‐tryptophan. Given the renewed pharmaceutical interest in psilocybin, our results may lay the foundation for its biotechnological production.

Thanks Trickster, we have a related thread here: https://www.dmt-nexus.me...aspx?g=posts&t=81137 with a small discussion on this. Hoping we get to work on it, would be very interesting to mix some mexamine with a protein mushroom extract and SAMe. Cheers.

Sorry. I did a search on the article title, did not find it, so I posted it here. Should I delete it?

My fault, I should post the article titles - will do so from now on.

I think it's fine here also as this is an important paper. A mod can merge the threads if they want.

I'm happy to see more interested in this sort of work