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Engineering of Escherichia coli for the biosynthesis of poly(3-hydroxybutyrate-co-3-hydroxyhexanoate) from glucose

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Abstract

The copolymer poly(3-hydroxybutyrate-co-3-hydroxyhexanoate) [P(HB-co-HHx)] has the potential to serve as a biodegradable tissue engineering material. However, the production of this kind of copolymer still suffers from high cost and uncertainty. We describe here the design of metabolic pathways to synthesize P(HB-co-HHx) directly from glucose using recombinant Escherichia coli. By combining the BktB-dependent condensation pathway with the inverted β-oxidation cycle pathway, we were able to synthesize a P(HB-co-HHx) copolymer with a 10 mol% HHx fraction in recombinant E. coli. After optimizing the host strain and employing thioesterase mutant strains, the engineered E. coli produced 12.9 wt% P(HB-co-HHx) with a 13.2 mol% 3HHx fraction.

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Acknowledgments

This research was financially supported by grants from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (31200033), the National Basic Research Program of China (2012CB725202 and 2011CB707405), and the Specialized Research Fund for the Doctoral Program of Higher Education of China (20120131120081).

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  1. National Glycoengineering Research Center, State Key Laboratory of Microbial Technology, Shandong University, Jinan, 250100, People’s Republic of China

    Qian Wang, Yaqi Luan, Xuelian Cheng, Qianqian Zhuang & Qingsheng Qi

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  1. Qian Wang
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Correspondence to Qingsheng Qi.

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Wang, Q., Luan, Y., Cheng, X. et al. Engineering of Escherichia coli for the biosynthesis of poly(3-hydroxybutyrate-co-3-hydroxyhexanoate) from glucose. Appl Microbiol Biotechnol 99, 2593–2602 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00253-015-6380-0

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