Production of free fatty acids from various carbon sources by Ogataea polymorpha
Yunxia Li, Xiaoxin Zhai, Wei Yu, Dao Feng, Aamer Ali Shah, Jiaoqi Gao, Yongjin J. Zhou
Abstract
Energy shortage and environmental concern urgently require establishing the feasible bio-refinery process from various feedstocks. The methylotrophic yeast Ogataea polymorpha is thermo-tolerant and can utilize various carbon sources, such as glucose, xylose and methanol, which makes it a promising host for bio-manufacturing. Here, we explored the capacity of O. polymorpha for overproduction of free fatty acids (FFAs) from multiple substrates. The engineered yeast produced 674 mg/L FFA from 20 g/L glucose in shake flask and could sequentially utilize the mixture of glucose and xylose. However, the FFA producing strain failed to survive in sole methanol and supplementing co-substrate xylose promoted methanol metabolism. A synergistic utilization of xylose and methanol was observed in the FFA producing strain. Finally, a mixture of glucose, xylose and methanol was evaluated for FFA production (1.2 g/L). This study showed that O. polymorpha is an ideal host for chemical production from various carbon sources.