A single enzyme unlocks nature's own sunscreen ingredient

High in Japan, an edible freshwater microbe called Suizenji-nori makes two natural compounds, saclipins A and B, that absorb ultraviolet light — the kind of ingredient sunscreen makers dream about, except the microbe makes far too little to use. Now Professor Hakuto Kageyama and graduate student Yoshie Uchida at Meijo University, with a colleague at Chulalongkorn University in Thailand, have found the gateway enzyme, AsLOX2, that starts the whole process: it converted more than 80% of its starting material within minutes, and the team then completed the route to both saclipins in the lab. Published in the Journal of Natural Products, it is a first practical path to making nature's sunscreen without stripping it from a scarce source.

SDG 9 · Industry, innovation and infrastructure — Mechanism: tech innovation