Abstract
In typical acetone–butanol–ethanol (ABE) fermentation, acetone is the main by-product (50 % of butanol mass) of butanol production, resulting in a low yield of butanol. It is known that some Clostridium tetanomorphum strains are able to produce butanol without acetone in nature. Here, we described that C. tetanomorphum strain DSM665 can produce 4.16 g/L butanol and 4.98 g/L ethanol at pH 6.0, and 9.81 g/L butanol and 1.01 g/L ethanol when adding 1 mM methyl viologen. Butyrate and acetate could be reassimilated and no acetone was produced. Further analysis indicated that the activity of the acetate/butyrate:acetoacetyl-CoA transferase responsible for acetone production is lost in C. tetanomorphum DSM665. The genome of C. tetanomorphum DSM665 was sequenced and deposited in DDBJ, EMBL, and GenBank under the accession no. APJS00000000. Sequence analysis indicated that there are no typical genes (ctfA/B and adc) that are typically parts of an acetone synthesis pathway in C. tetanomorphum DSM665. This work provides new insights in the mechanism of clostridial butanol production and should prove useful for the design of a high-butanol-producing strain.
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This study was funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant number 31270107), the Knowledge Innovation Program of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (grant number KSCX2-EW-J-6), and the National High Technology Research and Development Program of China (grant number 2011AA02A208).
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All authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.
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This article does not contain any studies with human participants or animals performed by any of the authors.
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Fuyu Gong and Guanhui Bao contributed equally to this work.
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Gong, F., Bao, G., Zhao, C. et al. Fermentation and genomic analysis of acetone-uncoupled butanol production by Clostridium tetanomorphum . Appl Microbiol Biotechnol 100, 1523–1529 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00253-015-7121-0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00253-015-7121-0