The production of isoprene from cellulose using recombinant Clostridium cellulolyticum strains expressing isoprene synthase.

Isoprene is an important bulk chemical which is mostly derived from fossil fuels. It is used primarily for the production of synthetic rubber. Sustainable, biotechnology-based alternatives for the production of isoprene rely on the fermentation of sugars from food and feed crops, creating an ethical dilemma due to the competition for agricultural land. This issue could be addressed by developing new approaches based on the production of isoprene from abundant renewable waste streams. Here, we describe a proof-of-principle approach for the production of isoprene from cellulosic biomass, the most abundant polymer on earth. We engineered the mesophilic prokaryote Clostridium cellulolyticum, which can degrade cellulosic biomass, to utilize the resulting glucose monomers as a feedstock for the production of isoprene. This was achieved by integrating the poplar gene encoding isoprene synthase. The presence of the enzyme was confirmed by targeted proteomics, and the accumulation of isoprene was confirmed by GC-MS/MS. We have shown for the first time that engineered C. cellulolyticum can be used as a metabolic chassis for the sustainable production of isoprene.

Metabolic engineering of Clostridium cellulolyticum for the production of n-butanol from crystalline cellulose.

BACKGROUND: Sustainable alternatives for the production of fuels and chemicals are needed to reduce our dependency on fossil resources and to avoid the negative impact of their excessive use on the global climate. Lignocellulosic feedstock from agricultural residues, energy crops and municipal solid waste provides an abundant and carbon-neutral alternative, but it is recalcitrant towards microbial degradation and must therefore undergo extensive pretreatment to release the monomeric sugar units used by biofuel-producing microbes. These pretreatment steps can be reduced by using microbes such as Clostridium cellulolyticum that naturally digest lignocellulose, but this limits the range of biofuels that can be produced. We therefore developed a metabolic engineering approach in C. cellulolyticum to expand its natural product spectrum and to fine tune the engineered metabolic pathways. RESULTS: Here we report the metabolic engineering of C. cellulolyticum to produce n-butanol, a next-generation biofuel and important chemical feedstock, directly from crystalline cellulose. We introduced the CoA-dependent pathway for n-butanol synthesis from C. acetobutylicum and measured the expression of functional enzymes (using targeted proteomics) and the abundance of metabolic intermediates (by LC-MS/MS) to identify potential bottlenecks in the n-butanol biosynthesis pathway. We achieved yields of 40 and 120 mg/L n-butanol from cellobiose and crystalline cellulose, respectively, after cultivating the bacteria for 6 and 20 days. CONCLUSION: The analysis of enzyme activities and key intracellular metabolites provides a robust framework to determine the metabolic flux through heterologous pathways in C. cellulolyticum, allowing further improvements by fine tuning individual steps to improve the yields of n-butanol.

Expression of heterologous sigma factors enables functional screening of metagenomic and heterologous genomic libraries.

A key limitation in using heterologous genomic or metagenomic libraries in functional genomics and genome engineering is the low expression of heterologous genes in screening hosts, such as Escherichia coli. To overcome this limitation, here we generate E. coli strains capable of recognizing heterologous promoters by expressing heterologous sigma factors. Among seven sigma factors tested, RpoD from Lactobacillus plantarum (Lpl) appears to be able of initiating transcription from all sources of DNA. Using the promoter GFP-trap concept, we successfully screen several heterologous and metagenomic DNA libraries, thus enlarging the genomic space that can be functionally sampled in E. coli. For an application, we show that screening fosmid-based Lpl genomic libraries in an E. coli strain with a chromosomally integrated Lpl rpoD enables the identification of Lpl genetic determinants imparting strong ethanol tolerance in E. coli. Transcriptome analysis confirms increased expression of heterologous genes in the engineered strain.

Synthetic tolerance: three noncoding small RNAs, DsrA, ArcZ and RprA, acting supra-additively against acid stress.

Synthetic acid tolerance, especially during active cell growth, is a desirable phenotype for many biotechnological applications. Natively, acid resistance in Escherichia coli is largely a stationary-phase phenotype attributable to mechanisms mostly under the control of the stationary-phase sigma factor RpoS. We show that simultaneous overexpression of noncoding small RNAs (sRNAs), DsrA, RprA and ArcZ, which are translational RpoS activators, increased acid tolerance (based on a low-pH survival assay) supra-additively up to 8500-fold during active cell growth, and provided protection against carboxylic acid and oxidative stress. Overexpression of rpoS without its regulatory 5'-UTR resulted in inferior acid tolerance. The supra-additive effect of overexpressing the three sRNAs results from the impact their expression has on RpoS-protein levels, and the beneficial perturbation of the interconnected RpoS and H-NS networks, thus leading to superior tolerance during active growth. Unlike the overexpression of proteins, overexpression of sRNAs imposes hardly any metabolic burden on cells, and constitutes a more effective strain engineering strategy.

Exploring the combinatorial genomic space in Escherichia coli for ethanol tolerance.

Strain tolerance to toxic chemicals is desirable for biologically producing biofuels and chemicals. Standard genomic libraries can be screened to identify genes imparting tolerance, but cannot capture interactions among proximal or distant loci. In search of ethanol tolerance determinants, we expanded the genomic space combinatorially by screening coexisting genomic libraries (CoGeLs) of fosmids (large inserts) and plasmids (smaller inserts) under increasing ethanol concentrations. Such screening led to identification of interacting genetic loci imparting ethanol tolerance. One pair of fragments ([galT, galE] and [recA, pncC, mltB]) increased survival under 50 g/L ethanol by 38% when coexpressed, but individually the fragments had no effect. Coexpression of two genomic fragments ([sfsB, murA, yrbA, mlaB, mlaC, mlaD, mlaE, mlaF, yrbG] and [yrbA, mlaB, mlaC]) enhanced Escherichia coli survival to 50 g/L ethanol by up to 115%. A 35-kb fosmid fragment increased tolerance to 63 g/L ethanol by 160%. While the tolerance levels of these strains compare favorably to or exceed the performance of previously reported engineered strains, more significantly, this study demonstrates that combinatorial library screening and screening fosmid libraries offer new, previously unexplored tools for identifying genetic determinants of ethanol, and by extrapolation, other alcohol tolerance.

Coexisting/Coexpressing Genomic Libraries (CoGeL) identify interactions among distantly located genetic loci for developing complex microbial phenotypes.

In engineering novel microbial strains for biotechnological applications, beyond a priori identifiable pathways to be engineered, it is becoming increasingly important to develop complex, ill-defined cellular phenotypes. One approach is to screen genomic or metagenomic libraries to identify genes imparting desirable phenotypes, such as tolerance to stressors or novel catabolic programs. Such libraries are limited by their inability to identify interactions among distant genetic loci. To solve this problem, we constructed plasmid- and fosmid-based Escherichia coli Coexisting/Coexpressing Genomic Libraries (CoGeLs). As a proof of principle, four sets of two genes of the l-lysine biosynthesis pathway distantly located on the E. coli chromosome were knocked out. Upon transformation of these auxotrophs with CoGeLs, cells growing without supplementation were found to harbor library inserts containing the knocked-out genes demonstrating the interaction between the two libraries. CoGeLs were also screened to identify genetic loci that work synergistically to create the considerably more complex acid-tolerance phenotype. CoGeL screening identified combination of genes known to enhance acid tolerance (gadBC operon and adiC), but also identified the novel combination of arcZ and recA that greatly enhanced acid tolerance by 9000-fold. arcZ is a small RNA that we show increases pH tolerance alone and together with recA.

Inactivation of σF in Clostridium acetobutylicum ATCC 824 blocks sporulation prior to asymmetric division and abolishes σE and σG protein expression but does not block solvent formation.

Clostridium acetobutylicum is both a model organism for the understanding of sporulation in solventogenic clostridia and its relationship to solvent formation and an industrial organism for anaerobic acetone-butanol-ethanol (ABE) fermentation. How solvent production is coupled to endospore formation--both stationary-phase events--remains incompletely understood at the molecular level. Specifically, it is unclear how sporulation-specific sigma factors affect solvent formation. Here the sigF gene in C. acetobutylicum was successfully disrupted and silenced. Not only σ(F) but also the sigma factors σ(E) and σ(G) were not detected in the sigF mutant (FKO1), and differentiation was stopped prior to asymmetric division. Since plasmid expression of the spoIIA operon (spoIIAA-spoIIAB-sigF) failed to complement FKO1, the operon was integrated into the FKO1 chromosome to generate strain FKO1-C. In FKO1-C, σ(F) expression was restored along with sporulation and σ(E) and σ(G) protein expression. Quantitative reverse transcription-PCR (RT-PCR) analysis of a select set of genes (csfB, gpr, spoIIP, sigG, lonB, and spoIIR) that could be controlled by σ(F), based on the Bacillus subtilis model, indicated that sigG may be under the control of σ(F), but spoIIR, an important activator of σ(E) in B. subtilis, is not, and neither are the rest of the genes investigated. FKO1 produced solvents at a level similar to that of the parent strain, but solvent levels were dependent on the physiological state of the inoculum. Finally, the complementation strain FKO1-C is the first reported instance of purposeful integration of multiple functional genes into a clostridial chromosome--here, the C. acetobutylicum chromosome--with the aim of altering cell metabolism and differentiation.

A comparative view of metabolite and substrate stress and tolerance in microbial bioprocessing: From biofuels and chemicals, to biocatalysis and bioremediation.

Metabolites, substrates and substrate impurities may be toxic to cells by damaging biological molecules, organelles, membranes or disrupting biological processes. Chemical stress is routinely encountered in bioprocessing to produce chemicals or fuels from renewable substrates, in whole-cell biocatalysis and bioremediation. Cells respond, adapt and may develop tolerance to chemicals by mechanisms only partially explored, especially for multiple simultaneous stresses. More is known about how cells respond to chemicals, but less about how to develop tolerant strains. Aiming to stimulate new metabolic engineering and synthetic-biology approaches for tolerant-strain development, this review takes a holistic, comparative and modular approach in bringing together the large literature on genes, programs, mechanisms, processes and molecules involved in chemical stress or imparting tolerance. These include stress proteins and transcription factors, efflux pumps, altered membrane composition, stress-adapted energy metabolism, chemical detoxification, and accumulation of small-molecule chaperons and compatible solutes. The modular organization (by chemicals, mechanism, organism, and methods used) imparts flexibility in exploring this complex literature, while comparative analyses point to hidden commonalities, such as an oxidative stress response underlying some solvent and carboxylic-acid stress. Successes involving one or a few genes, as well as global genomic approaches are reviewed with an eye to future developments that would engage novel genomic and systems-biology tools to create altered or semi-synthetic strains with superior tolerance characteristics for bioprocessing.

Flow cytometry for bacteria: enabling metabolic engineering, synthetic biology and the elucidation of complex phenotypes.

Flow cytometry (FC) and FC-based cell sorting have been established as critical tools in modern cell and developmental biology. Yet, their applications in bacteria, especially in the multiparametric mode, remain limited. We argue that FC technologies have the potential to greatly accelerate the analysis and development of microbial complex phenotypes through applications of metabolic engineering, synthetic biology, and evolutionary engineering. We demonstrate the importance of FC for elucidating population heterogeneity because of developmental processes or epigenetic regulation. FC can be engaged for both synthetic and analytical applications of complex phenotypes within a single species, multispecies, and microbial-library populations. Examples include methods to identify developmental microbial stages associated with productive metabolic phenotypes, select desirable promoters from a single species or metagenomic libraries, and to screen designer riboswitches for synthetic-biology applications.

Development and application of flow-cytometric techniques for analyzing and sorting endospore-forming clostridia.

The study of microbial heterogeneity at the single-cell level is a rapidly growing area of research in microbiology and biotechnology due to its significance in pathogenesis, environmental biology, and industrial biotechnologies. However, the tools available for efficiently and precisely probing such heterogeneity are limited for most bacteria. Here we describe the development and application of flow-cytometric (FC) and fluorescence-assisted cell-sorting techniques for the study of endospore-forming bacteria. We show that by combining FC light scattering (LS) with nucleic acid staining, we can discriminate, quantify, and enrich all sporulation-associated morphologies exhibited by the endospore-forming anaerobe Clostridium acetobutylicum. Using FC LS analysis, we quantitatively show that clostridial cultures commonly perform multiple rounds of sporulation and that sporulation is induced earlier by the overexpression of Spo0A, the master regulator of endospore formers. To further demonstrate the power of our approach, we employed FC LS analysis to generate compelling evidence to challenge the long-accepted view in the field that the clostridial cell form is the solvent-forming phenotype.