Construction of an Artificial Biosynthetic Pathway for Zingerone Production in Using Benzalacetone Synthase from .

Zingerone (vanillylacetone; 4-hydroxy-3-methoxyphenylethyl methyl ketone) is a key component responsible for the pungency of ginger (). In this study, it was confirmed that a type III polyketide synthase (PKS) gene () from exhibits feruloyl-CoA-preferred benzalacetone synthase (BAS) activity. Based on these results, we constructed an artificial biosynthetic pathway for zingerone production from supplemented ferulic acid with 4-coumarate CoA ligase (4CL), PmPKS, and benzalacetone reductase (BAR). Furthermore, a pathway for the production of zingerone was assembled using six heterologous genes, encoding tyrosine ammonia-lyase (), cinnamate-4-hydroxlase (5), caffeic acid O-methyltransferase (), 4CL (42), BAS (), and BAR (1), in . Using the engineered l-tyrosine-overproducing ΔCOS4 strain as a host, a maximum yield of 24.03 ± 2.53 mg/L zingerone was achieved by complete synthesis.