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Biological production of l-malate: recent advances and future prospects

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Abstract

As intermediates in the TCA cycle, l-malate and its derivatives have been widely applied in the food, pharmaceutical, agriculture, and bio-based material industries. In recent years, biological routes have been regarded as very promising approaches as cost-effective ways to l-malate production from low-priced raw materials. In this mini-review, we provide a comprehensive overview of current developments of l-malate production using both biocatalysis and microbial fermentation. Biocatalysis is enzymatic transformation of fumarate to l-malate, here, the source of enzymes, catalytic conditions, and enzymatic molecular modification may be concluded. For microbial fermentation, the types of microorganisms, genetic characteristics, biosynthetic pathways, metabolic engineering strategies, fermentation substrates, and optimization of cultivation conditions have been discussed and compared. Furthermore, the combination of enzyme and metabolic engineering has also been summarized. In future, we also expect that novel biological approaches using industrially relevant strains and renewable raw materials can overcome the technical challenges involved in cost-efficient l-malate production.

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Acknowledgements

This work was financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation (31622001, 31671845, 21676119), and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (JUSRP51307A and JUSRP51307A).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Key Laboratory of Carbohydrate Chemistry and Biotechnology, Ministry of Education, Jiangnan University, Wuxi, 214122, China

    Jingjing Liu, Jianghua Li, Guocheng Du & Long Liu

  2. Key Laboratory of Industrial Biotechnology, Ministry of Education, Jiangnan University, Wuxi, 214122, China

    Jingjing Liu, Jianghua Li, Guocheng Du, Jian Chen & Long Liu

  3. School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, 30332, USA

    Hyun-dong Shin

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  1. Jingjing Liu
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  2. Jianghua Li
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  3. Hyun-dong Shin
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  4. Guocheng Du
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  5. Jian Chen
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  6. Long Liu
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Correspondence to Jianghua Li or Long Liu.

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Liu, J., Li, J., Shin, Hd. et al. Biological production of l-malate: recent advances and future prospects. World J Microbiol Biotechnol 34, 6 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11274-017-2349-8

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