Fig. 2: Binding to the pyrophosphate and first sugar of Lipid II is dominant.

a 1D ³¹P spectra of Lipid II in liposomes in the presence (pink) and absence (gray) of [R4L10]-teixobactin. Orange asterisks mark PPi signals; bulk lipids come around 0 ppm. b 2D ¹H³¹P spectrum of the complex. Dashed lines indicate chemical shifts of the amino protons of Ser7, Ala9, and Leu10. c Chemical model of Lipid II. d 2D ¹³C¹³C PARISxy⁴⁸ spectra of the ¹³C,¹⁵N-labelled complex measured using 50 (cyan) and 600 ms (yellow) magnetization transfer time. Contacts within and between [R4L10]-teixobactin molecules labelled in black, intramolecular Lipid II contacts in blue, interfacial contacts in red. See Supplementary Fig. 5 for the full spectrum. e Sum of interfacial contacts between [R4L10]-teixobactin and the sugars MurNAc (magenta) and GlcNAc (green); ambiguous contacts in gray. Source data are provided as a Source Data file. f Illustration of interface and topology of the complex. [R4L10]-teixobactin resides at the water–lipid interface with Ile2 and Ile6 partitioning into the membrane. The ring motif coordinates PPi. MurNAc (M, magenta) and, to a minor extent, GlcNAc (G, green) also interact with the ring motif. The mobile pentapeptide (orange) is not involved in the interaction.