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Increased Production of Colanic Acid by an Engineered Escherichia coli Strain, Mediated by Genetic and Environmental Perturbations

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Abstract

Colanic acid (CA) is a major exopolysaccharide synthesized by Escherichia coli that serves as a constituent of biofilm matrices. CA demonstrates potential applications in the food, cosmetics, and pharmaceutical industry. Moreover, l-fucose, a monomeric constituent of CA, exhibits various physiological activities, such as antitumor, anti-inflammatory, and skin-whitening. Here, the effects of genetic and environmental perturbations were investigated for improving CA production by E. coli. When rcsF, a positive regulator gene of CA synthesis, was expressed in E. coli ΔwaaF, a CA-producing strain constructed previously, the CA titer increased to 3051.2 mg/L as compared to 2052.8 mg/L observed with E. coli ΔwaaF. Among the environmental factors tested, namely, osmotic and oxidative stresses and pH, pH was a primary factor that significantly improved CA production. When the pH of the culture medium of E. coli ΔwaaF + rcsF was maintained at 7, the CA titer significantly increased to 4351.6 mg/L. The CA yield obtained with E. coli ΔwaaF + rcsF grown at pH 7 was 5180.4 mg CA/g dry cell weight, which is the highest yield of CA reported so far. This engineered E. coli system with optimization of environmental conditions can be employed for fast and economically-feasible production of CA.

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All data generated or analyzed during this study are included in this manucript.

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Acknowledgements

We acknowledge the facility support by the Institute of Biomedical and Food Safety at CJ Food Safety Hall, Korea University.

Funding

This work was supported by the Mid-career Researcher Program through the National Research Foundation of Korea (2020R1A2B5B02002631) and the Korea Institute of Planning and Evaluation for Technology in Food, Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries, funded by the Ministry of Agriculture, Food, and Rural Affairs (321036051SB010).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Biotechnology, Graduate School, Korea University, Seoul, 02841, Republic of Korea

    Eun Ju Yun, Yoonho Cho, Na Ree Han, In Jung Kim & Kyoung Heon Kim

  2. Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology, University of Illinois At Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL, 61801, USA

    Yong-Su Jin

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  1. Eun Ju Yun
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Contributions

KHK and YSJ conceived the project. YC and EJY designed the experiments. YC, EJY, NRH, and IJK performed the microbial fermentation and product analysis. YC, EJY, and KHK wrote the manuscript. All authors read and approved the fnal manuscript.

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Correspondence to Yong-Su Jin or Kyoung Heon Kim.

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K.H.K., E.J.Y., and Y.C. have filed a patent on a part of this work.

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Eun Ju Yun and Yoonho Cho contributed equally to this work.

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Yun, E.J., Cho, Y., Han, N.R. et al. Increased Production of Colanic Acid by an Engineered Escherichia coli Strain, Mediated by Genetic and Environmental Perturbations. Appl Biochem Biotechnol 193, 4083–4096 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12010-021-03671-0

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