Biobased production of alkanes and alkenes through metabolic engineering of microorganisms
Review article, 2017

Advancement in metabolic engineering of microorganisms has enabled bio-based production of a range of chemicals, and such engineered microorganism can be used for sustainable production leading to reduced carbon dioxide emission there. One area that has attained much interest is microbial hydrocarbon biosynthesis, and in particular, alkanes and alkenes are important high-value chemicals as they can be utilized for a broad range of industrial purposes as well as 'drop-in' biofuels. Some microorganisms have the ability to biosynthesize alkanes and alkenes naturally, but their production level is extremely low. Therefore, there have been various attempts to recruit other microbial cell factories for production of alkanes and alkenes by applying metabolic engineering strategies. Here we review different pathways and involved enzymes for alkane and alkene production and discuss bottlenecks and possible solutions to accomplish industrial level production of these chemicals by microbial fermentation.

Fatty acid biosynthesis

rate

Cell factories

Alkanes/alkenes

and yield)

Metabolic engineering

TRY (titer

Author

Min-Kyoung Kang

Chalmers, Biology and Biological Engineering, Systems and Synthetic Biology

Jens B Nielsen

Royal Institute of Technology (KTH)

Chalmers, Biology and Biological Engineering, Systems and Synthetic Biology

Novo Nordisk Foundation

Journal of Industrial Microbiology and Biotechnology

1367-5435 (ISSN) 1476-5535 (eISSN)

Vol. 44 4-5 613-622

Subject Categories

Industrial Biotechnology

Areas of Advance

Energy

Life Science Engineering (2010-2018)

DOI

10.1007/s10295-016-1814-y

PubMed

27565672

More information

Latest update

5/26/2023