Abstract
Saccharomyces cerevisiae has been used for thousands of years for alcoholic beverage and bread production. Today, it is also used in biotechnological processes with a major focus on bioethanol production. This yeast is nonpathogenic and classified as GRAS (generally regarded as safe). S. cerevisiae is the most intensively studied eukaryotic microorganism and has been instrumental in establishing our current wealth of information in biochemistry, genetics and cell biology. Studies over many years have resulted in refined methods to manipulate and analyze its biology, biochemistry, and genetics. Highly efficient methods for transformation and construction of gene knockouts are only two examples of a plethora of methodologies widely available. These advances together with having the genome sequence have made S. cerevisiae an ideal model for both basic and applied research. Metabolic engineering has been used for optimization of specific production processes, including extending the range of compounds either assimilated or synthesized by a given pathway or process, blocking the synthesis of by-products and improvement of productivity and yield.
The rational use of lignocellulosic biomass for second-generation bioethanol/biofuel production and other chemicals with added value will clearly increase in the coming years. The importance of developing second-generation bioethanol is due to limitations associated with production of first-generation bioethanol and especially the decline in availability and devastating consequences of continued fossil fuel use. Fermentable sugars present in plant lignocellulosic biomass are mainly glucose, xylose and arabinose. Wild-type strains of S. cerevisiae are unable to consume the pentoses. Construction of recombinant strains able to assimilate lignocellulosic xylose for ethanol production is a developing area of investigation that we describe below. Metabolic and evolutionary engineering has been successfully used in some cases, although there is still no strain capable of producing ethanol from xylose or arabinose at industrial levels. Production of ethanol as well as other valuable chemicals from lignocellulosic xylose and arabinose will require further investigation.
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Malan, A.K., Fagundez, A., Gill, P.R., Batista, S.B. (2016). Engineering Hemicellulose-Derived Xylose Utilization in Saccharomyces cerevisiae for Biotechnological Applications. In: Castro-Sowinski, S. (eds) Microbial Models: From Environmental to Industrial Sustainability. Microorganisms for Sustainability, vol 1. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-2555-6_3
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