Oxidative degradation, of aromatic compounds, by Pseudomonas

Pyrocatechase occurs in aerobic microorganisms Pseudomonas, Vdmo, Mycobacterium) as part of a network of enzymes which catalyze the oxidative degradation of aromatic compounds to succinate and acetyl-CoA (Fig. 1) (182,313,433,674,693,698,759). These processes have been extensively studied by means of adaptive phenomena, and by chemical isolation of products formed by living cells (63,234-236,238,291,423,676-678,690, 8). The pyrocatechase step consists in oxidation of catechol to m,m-muconic acid (equation 4), (237,322) ... 

The pioneering work of Gibson3 on the isolation and mutation of Pseudomonas strains that oxidatively degrade aromatic compounds has led, 25 years later, to the application of cyclohexadiene cis-diols in asymmetric synthesis. The first applications of these types of compounds to synthesis were the use of meso-diol derived from benzene for production of polyphenylene4 by ICI and in the synthesis of racemic... 

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