About this Research Topic
Since the First Industrial Revolution, humans have made unprecedented progress using carbon-based fossil fuels. However, this has been accompanied by the depletion of non-renewable petrochemical resources and carbon emissions far exceeding natural carbon balance capabilities. An emerging production paradigm based on renewable carbon sources is becoming the future trend.
The rapid development of microbial synthetic biology has provided an important driving force for transforming and utilizing different carbon sources. It combines modern biotechnology with data science to design and transform specific microorganisms into cell factories for synthesizing various materials. The cell factory takes sugar, grease, and some other recyclable substances (for example, off-gas) as raw materials, and the carbon in the products comes from the carbon dioxide in the environment, to better maintain the natural carbon cycle and reduce the dependence on petrochemical resources. Currently, synthetic microbial cell factories based on all kinds of renewable carbon sources have been widely used in fields such as healthcare, green energy, daily cosmetics, bio-based materials, and food consumption. The broad prospect of microbial synthetic biotechnology is leading to an upsurge of entrepreneurship and investment at home and abroad.
Carbon source is the starting point and determining factor for biological manufacturing. Although the technical route of grain as a carbon source has been verified, the large-scale development of the fermentation industry cannot be supported by grain as the mainstream carbon source from the perspective of output, price, and policy. Therefore, the development of new non-grain carbon sources has become a top priority.
The recent breakthroughs of synthetic biotechnology in genome editing tools and the acquisition and analysis of extensive omics data have made it possible to recruit genetic elements across species and redesign chassis cells at the molecular level in microorganisms. Accordingly, metabolic pathways or functional modules could be restructured, debugged, and applied in classical and even some non-model strains. More importantly, the synthetic microbial community learning from natural symbiosis phenomena holds great promise for developing and efficiently utilizing new carbon sources through the division of metabolic labor and construction of cross-species metabolic pathways.
This research topic aims to capture recent advances in microbial chassis exploration for new fermentable carbon source development. The scope of this research topic includes new strategies for accelerating carbon sources utilization, screening microorganisms from special habitats, metabolic mechanism analysis, and unconventional carbon sources exploration in the fermentation industry.
This topic is focused on, but not limited to, the publication of Original Research and Review articles on the following topics:
- Discoveries, tools, and methods in microorganisms for efficient utilization of carbon sources to improve titer, yield, productivity, etc.
- Screening microorganisms and/or the metabolic mechanism analysis for special carbon sources utilization
- Application exploration on unconventional carbon sources for industrial microorganisms, including but not limited to industrial by-product carbon sources (such as molasses and glycerol), wood fiber raw materials (such as straw and corn cob), urban household waste (such as dry waste and restaurant waste oil), industrial carbon-rich off-gas (such as CO2/CO/CH4), and other potential carbon sources such as methanol, formic acid, acetic acid, etc.
The rapid development of microbial synthetic biology has provided an important driving force for transforming and utilizing different carbon sources. It combines modern biotechnology with data science to design and transform specific microorganisms into cell factories for synthesizing various materials. The cell factory takes sugar, grease, and some other recyclable substances (for example, off-gas) as raw materials, and the carbon in the products comes from the carbon dioxide in the environment, to better maintain the natural carbon cycle and reduce the dependence on petrochemical resources. Currently, synthetic microbial cell factories based on all kinds of renewable carbon sources have been widely used in fields such as healthcare, green energy, daily cosmetics, bio-based materials, and food consumption. The broad prospect of microbial synthetic biotechnology is leading to an upsurge of entrepreneurship and investment at home and abroad.
Carbon source is the starting point and determining factor for biological manufacturing. Although the technical route of grain as a carbon source has been verified, the large-scale development of the fermentation industry cannot be supported by grain as the mainstream carbon source from the perspective of output, price, and policy. Therefore, the development of new non-grain carbon sources has become a top priority.
The recent breakthroughs of synthetic biotechnology in genome editing tools and the acquisition and analysis of extensive omics data have made it possible to recruit genetic elements across species and redesign chassis cells at the molecular level in microorganisms. Accordingly, metabolic pathways or functional modules could be restructured, debugged, and applied in classical and even some non-model strains. More importantly, the synthetic microbial community learning from natural symbiosis phenomena holds great promise for developing and efficiently utilizing new carbon sources through the division of metabolic labor and construction of cross-species metabolic pathways.
This research topic aims to capture recent advances in microbial chassis exploration for new fermentable carbon source development. The scope of this research topic includes new strategies for accelerating carbon sources utilization, screening microorganisms from special habitats, metabolic mechanism analysis, and unconventional carbon sources exploration in the fermentation industry.
This topic is focused on, but not limited to, the publication of Original Research and Review articles on the following topics:
- Discoveries, tools, and methods in microorganisms for efficient utilization of carbon sources to improve titer, yield, productivity, etc.
- Screening microorganisms and/or the metabolic mechanism analysis for special carbon sources utilization
- Application exploration on unconventional carbon sources for industrial microorganisms, including but not limited to industrial by-product carbon sources (such as molasses and glycerol), wood fiber raw materials (such as straw and corn cob), urban household waste (such as dry waste and restaurant waste oil), industrial carbon-rich off-gas (such as CO2/CO/CH4), and other potential carbon sources such as methanol, formic acid, acetic acid, etc.
Keywords: Synthetic Biology, Carbon Source, screening, mechanism, fermentation, unconventional carbon source
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