Production of cellulosic organic acids via synthetic fungal consortia.

Consolidated bioprocessing (CBP) is a potential breakthrough technology for reducing costs of biochemical production from lignocellulosic biomass. Production of cellulase enzymes, saccharification of lignocellulose, and conversion of the resulting sugars into a chemical of interest occur simultaneously within a single bioreactor. In this study, synthetic fungal consortia composed of the cellulolytic fungus Trichoderma reesei and the production specialist Rhizopus delemar demonstrated conversion of microcrystalline cellulose (MCC) and alkaline pre-treated corn stover (CS) to fumaric acid in a fully consolidated manner without addition of cellulase enzymes or expensive supplements such as yeast extract.

Design and characterization of synthetic fungal-bacterial consortia for direct production of isobutanol from cellulosic biomass.

Synergistic microbial communities are ubiquitous in nature and exhibit appealing features, such as sophisticated metabolic capabilities and robustness. This has inspired fast-growing interest in engineering synthetic microbial consortia for biotechnology development. However, there are relatively few reports of their use in real-world applications, and achieving population stability and regulation has proven to be challenging.

Microbial utilization of aqueous co-products from hydrothermal liquefaction of microalgae Nannochloropsis oculata.

Hydrothermal liquefaction of algae biomass is a promising technology for the production of sustainable biofuels, but the non-oil, aqueous co-product of the process has only been examined to a limited extent. The aqueous phase from liquefaction of the alga Nannochloropsis oculata (AqAl) was used to make growth media for model heterotrophic microorganisms Escherichia coli, Pseudomonas putida, and Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Growth rates, yields, and carbon/nitrogen/phosphorus uptake were measured.

Evolution combined with genomic study elucidates genetic bases of isobutanol tolerance in Escherichia coli.

Background: Isobutanol is a promising next-generation biofuel with demonstrated high yield microbial production, but the toxicity of this molecule reduces fermentation volumetric productivity and final titer. Organic solvent tolerance is a complex, multigenic phenotype that has been recalcitrant to rational engineering approaches. We apply experimental evolution followed by genome resequencing and a gene expression study to elucidate genetic bases of adaptation to exogenous isobutanol stress.

Network benchmarking: a happy marriage between systems and synthetic biology.

In their new Cell paper, Cantone et al. (2009) present exciting results on constructing and utilizing a small synthetic gene regulatory network in yeast that draws from two rapidly developing fields of systems and synthetic biology.