earticle

영어

1-Propanol is a next-generation biofuel used not only as a gasoline substitute, but also as various industrial products such as paint and cosmetics. In terms of energy density and combustion efficiency, it is advantageous than the traditional bio-fuel, ethanol. Previously, Atsumi et al. reported that a metabolically engineered Escherichia coli harboring an engineered citramalate synthase (CimA), which converts pyruvate directly into 2-ketobutyrate, from Methanococcus jannaschii produced the highest reported concentration of 1-propanol, 3.5 g L-1. Toward this goal, novel synthetic pathway for 1-propanol production, deleting competing pathway and carbon source optimization based on the in silico flux response analysis was established. Additional metabolic engineering strategy of the resulting strain further improved the titer. [This work was supported by the Advanced Biomass R&D Center of Korea (ABC-2010-0029799) through the Global Frontier Research Program of the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology (MEST). Further supports by EEWS program of KAIST, and the World Class University program (R32-2008-000-10142-0) of the MEST are appreciated.]