Harnessing Yarrowia metabolism to generate high value terpenoids

叶黄素是一种具有抗氧化作用的色素类胡萝卜素，广泛应用于食品和动物饲料中。当然，它是在不同的植物和藻类中产生的。动物，包括人类，不会合成自己的叶黄素，然而，这种化合物对健康是必不可少的。目前，用于食品和饲料或医药用途的叶黄素是从万寿菊(万寿菊属)中提取的，它在那里积累的数量很少，需要大量的土地和化肥，使其成为一种非常昂贵的产品。到目前为止，还不存在有效的生物技术生产过程。该项目的目标是首次开发使用工程微生物生产叶黄素。利用最先进的基因组工程合成生物学方法，我们将把合成叶黄素的能力从植物转移到工业酵母中。将通过筛选不同的植物基因组合来进一步优化生产，以便找到它们之间的正确平衡，从而导致这种有价值的化合物的数量增加。拥有最佳组合的菌株，因此是最好的生产者，将在类似工业的条件下使用生物反应器进行研究，在那里可以优化和最大化产量。此外，我们将探索利用其他行业的废液(如生物柴油生产的甘油)生产叶黄素的能力，这将有助于开发循环工艺和减少产生的废物。该项目将由伦敦帝国理工学院的Rodrigo Ledesma-Amaro博士小组和Acies Bio公司密切合作完成，Acies Bio公司是专门开发新菌株和生物工艺的领先工业生物技术公司之一。

Lutein, a pigmented carotenoid with antioxidant effects, is extensively used in food and animal feed. Naturally, it is produced in different plants and algae. Animals, including humans, do not synthetase its own lutein, however, this compound is essential for health. At the moment lutein for food & feed or pharmaceutical usage is extracted from marigold flowers (Tagetes spp.), where it is accumulated in low amounts and which requires a vast amount of land and fertilisers, making it a very expensive product. So far, an efficient biotechnological production process does not exist. The aim of the project is to develop, for the first time, the production of lutein using engineered microorganisms. Using state of the art synthetic biology methods for genome engineering we will transfer the capacity to synthesise lutein from plants to the in industrial yeast Yarrowia lipolytica. The production will be further optimised by screening different combination of plant genes in order to find the right balance of them that leads to high amounts of this valuable compound. The strains harbouring the best combinations, therefore the best producers, will be studied in industrial-like conditions using bioreactors, where the production can be optimised and maximised. In addition, we will explore the capacity to produce lutein using waste streams from other industries (i. e. Glycerol from biodiesel production), which will help to develop a circular process and to reduce generated waste.The project will be done in close collaboration between the group of Dr Rodrigo Ledesma-Amaro from Imperial College London and Acies Bio, one of the leading industrial biotech companies specialised in the development of new strains and bioprocesses.