Production of muconic acid in plants
- Joint BioEnergy Institute, Emeryville, CA (United States); Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States). Environmental Genomics and Systems Biology Division
- Joint BioEnergy Institute, Emeryville, CA (United States); Université Paris-Saclay, Palaiseau (France). Ecole Polytechnique
- Joint BioEnergy Institute, Emeryville, CA (United States); Univ. of California, Berkeley, CA (United States). Department of Bioengineering, Department of Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering
- Joint BioEnergy Institute, Emeryville, CA (United States); Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States). Biological Systems and Engineering Division
- Joint BioEnergy Institute, Emeryville, CA (United States); Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States). Environmental Genomics and Systems Biology Division; Univ. of California, Berkeley, CA (United States). Department of Plant and Microbial Biology; Université Lyon, CNRS, Microbiologie, Adaptation et Pathogénie, Villeurbanne (France)
Muconic acid (MA) is a dicarboxylic acid used for the production of industrially relevant chemicals such as adipic acid, terephthalic acid, and caprolactam. Because the synthesis of these polymer precursors generates toxic intermediates by utilizing petroleum-derived chemicals and corrosive catalysts, the development of alternative strategies for the bio-based production of MA has garnered significant interest. Plants produce organic carbon skeletons by harvesting carbon dioxide and energy from the sun, and therefore represent advantageous hosts for engineered metabolic pathways towards the manufacturing of chemicals. In this work, we engineered Arabidopsis to demonstrate that plants can serve as green factories for the bio-manufacturing of MA. In particular, dual expression of plastid-targeted bacterial salicylate hydroxylase (NahG) and catechol 1,2-dioxygenase (CatA) resulted in the conversion of the endogenous salicylic acid (SA) pool into MA via catechol. Sequential increase of SA derived from the shikimate pathway was achieved by expressing plastid-targeted versions of bacterial salicylate synthase (Irp9) and feedback-resistant 3-deoxy-D-arabino-heptulosonate synthase (AroG). Introducing this SA over-producing strategy into engineered plants that co-express NahG and CatA resulted in a 50-fold increase in MA titers. Considering that MA was easily recovered from senesced plant biomass after harvest, we envision the phytoproduction of MA as a beneficial option to add value to bioenergy crops.
- Research Organization:
- Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE Office of Science (SC), Biological and Environmental Research (BER) (SC-23)
- Grant/Contract Number:
- AC02-05CH11231
- OSTI ID:
- 1465705
- Alternate ID(s):
- OSTI ID: 1630142
- Journal Information:
- Metabolic Engineering, Journal Name: Metabolic Engineering Journal Issue: C Vol. 46; ISSN 1096-7176
- Publisher:
- ElsevierCopyright Statement
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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