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Research

Biological systems - including the simplest cells - exhibit a broad range of functions to thrive in their environment. Research in the Imperial College Centre for Synthetic Biology is focused on the possibility of engineering the underlying biochemical processes to solve many of the challenges facing society, from healthcare to sustainable energy. In particular, we model, analyse, design and build biological and biochemical systems in living cells and/or in cell extracts, both exploring and enhancing the engineering potential of biology.

As part of our research we develop novel methods to accelerate the celebrated Design-Build-Test-Learn synthetic biology cycle. As such research in the Centre for Synthetic Biology highly multi- and interdisciplinary covering computational modelling and machine learning approaches; automated platform development and genetic circuit engineering ; multi-cellular and multi-organismal interactions, including gene drive and genome engineering; metabolic engineering; in vitro/cell-free synthetic biology; engineered phages and directed evolution; and biomimetics, biomaterials and biological engineering.

Publications

Citation

BibTex format

@article{Wen:2020:10.1021/acssynbio.9b00331,
author = {Wen, Z and Ledesma-Amaro, R and Lu, M and Jin, M and Yang, S},
doi = {10.1021/acssynbio.9b00331},
journal = {ACS Synthetic Biology},
pages = {304--315},
title = {Metabolic engineering of clostridium cellulovorans to improve butanol production by consolidated bioprocessing.},
url = {http://dx.doi.org/10.1021/acssynbio.9b00331},
volume = {9},
year = {2020}
}

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TY - JOUR
AB - Clostridium cellulovorans DSM 743B can produce butyrate when grown on lignocellulose, but it can hardly synthesize butanol. In a previous study, C. cellulovorans was successfully engineered to switch the metabolism from butyryl-CoA to butanol by overexpressing an alcohol aldehyde dehydrogenase gene adhE1 from Clostridium acetobutylicum ATCC 824; however, its full potential in butanol production is still unexplored. In the study, a metabolic engineering approach based on a push-pull strategy was developed to further enhance cellulosic butanol production. In order to accomplish this, the carbon flux from acetyl-CoA to butyryl-CoA was pulled by overexpressing a trans-enoyl-coenzyme A reductase gene (ter), which can irreversibly catalyze crotonyl-CoA to butyryl-CoA. Then an acid reassimilation pathway uncoupled with acetone production was introduced to redirect the carbon flow from butyrate and acetate toward butyryl-CoA. Finally, xylose metabolism engineering was implemented by inactivating xylR (Clocel_0594) and araR (Clocel_1253), as well as overexpressing xylT (CA_C1345), which is expected to supply additional carbon and reducing power for CoA and butanol synthesis pathways. The final engineered strain produced 4.96 g/L of n-butanol from alkali extracted corn cobs (AECC), increasing by 235-fold compared to that of the wild type. It serves as a promising butanol producer by consolidated bioprocessing.
AU - Wen,Z
AU - Ledesma-Amaro,R
AU - Lu,M
AU - Jin,M
AU - Yang,S
DO - 10.1021/acssynbio.9b00331
EP - 315
PY - 2020///
SN - 2161-5063
SP - 304
TI - Metabolic engineering of clostridium cellulovorans to improve butanol production by consolidated bioprocessing.
T2 - ACS Synthetic Biology
UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.1021/acssynbio.9b00331
UR - https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31940438
UR - https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acssynbio.9b00331
UR - http://hdl.handle.net/10044/1/76736
VL - 9
ER -