Microbial hydantoinase (HYD) is an industrial enzyme. This enzyme has been used for the commercial production of optically pure D- or L-active amino acids in biocatalysis. It has also been used for the production of D-amino acid intermediate compounds through stereospecific hydrolysis of chemically synthesized cyclic hydantoins. These intermediates are widely used for semisynthetic antibiotics, peptide hormones, pyrethroids, and pesticides

Figure 1. The production of D-amino acid. D-hydantoinase (red circle) serves as an important enzyme in the pathway.

On our research cooperating with Yuh-Shyong Yang, we have identified a new substrate for D-HYD by GEMDOCK. Figure 2 showed the docked conformation of parabanate in D-HYD. Because the docked orientation was correspondent with the proposed conformation of the known substrate. Therefore we deduced that parabanate was a substrate for D-HYD. The experimental result also proved the hypothesis.

Figure 2. The docked conformation of parabanate.