Microbial biosynthesis provides a feasible approach to sustainable production of advanced biofuels and biochemicals from renewable feedstocks. Methanol is an ideal feedstock for bio-manufacturing since it can be produced from CO2 through green energy, such as solar energy.

A joint research group led by Professor Zhou Yongjin and Professor Zhang Lihua from the Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics (DICP) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) recently engineered and optimized Pichia pastoris for bioproduction of α-bisabolene from sole methanol with the aid of proteomics.

This study was published in JACS Au on April 29.

Engineering α-bisabolene production from sole methanol might provide a sustainable approach for advanced biofuel production. [IMAGE: GAO LINHUI]

The researchers extensively engineered industrial yeast Pichia pastoris for overproduction of bisabolene by optimizing an isoprenoid biosynthetic pathway in Pichia pastoris cytosol and peroxisome. By quantitative proteomic analysis, they  identified that acetoacetyl-CoA thiolase was a bottleneck in the peroxisomal isoprenoid biosynthetic pathway. They enhanced the expression of acetoacetyl-CoA thiolase to improve the α-bisabolene biosynthesis by 100 percent, which realized 1.1 g/L α-bisabolene production under fed-batch in shake-flask.

This study provides a feasible approach for optimizing the metabolic pathway for overproduction of other chemicals from sole methanol in Pichia pastoris.

“Engineering α-bisabolene production from sole methanol might provide a sustainable approach for advanced biofuel production,” said Professor Zhou. “We clearly showed here that proteomic analysis can help to optimize the biosynthetic pathway by identifying the pathway bottleneck,” added Professor Zhang.

For more information, please contact:

Professor Zhang Lihua

E-mail: lihuazhang@dicp.ac.cn

Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics,

Chinese Academy of Sciences

Source: Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics,

Chinese Academy of Sciences