Life Sciences & Biotechnology
Title : | Engineering efflux pumps in Azospirillum brasilense to improve sesquiterpenoid production |
Area of research : | Life Sciences & Biotechnology |
Focus area : | Microbial Engineering |
Principal Investigator : | Dr. Mukti Nath Mishra, CSIR-Central Institute of Medicinal and Aromatic Plants (CIMAP), Uttar Pradesh |
Timeline Start Year : | 2024 |
Timeline End Year : | 2027 |
Contact info : | mnathmishra@gmail.com |
Details
Executive Summary : | The study focuses on the engineering of heterologous sesquiterpenoid production in bacterial systems, but the main challenge is the intracellular accumulation of non-native sesquiterpinoids to toxic levels due to insufficient extracellular transport. Despite attempts to address this issue by expressing native or heterologous efflux pumps in E. coli, no sesquiterpenoid-specific native efflux pumps have been identified in either E. coli or new potential bacterial systems. Azospirillum brasilense, which has an endogenous high-flux isoprenoid pathway, has been engineered to improve the flux, producing more than 2 g/L carotenoids. However, this system only produces 40 mg/L α-humulene and 65 mg/L valencene, which is less than 5% of the carotenoid yield. This suggests that over 95% of the isopreprenoid flux is still available, which can be utilized to improve yields. The study proposes engineering the extracellular transport of sesquiterpenoids in A. brasilense to improve yields by using α-humulene and valencene as model compounds. The main focus will be on transcriptome-based identification of sesquiterpenoid-induced endogenous efflux pumps and optimizing their expression to improve the extracellular transport of non-native sesquiterpenoids. |
Total Budget (INR): | 40,18,766 |
Organizations involved