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Metabolic engineering of Clostridium tyrobutyricum for n-butanol production from maltose and soluble starch by overexpressing α-glucosidase

  • Bioenergy and biofuels
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Abstract

Clostridium tyrobutyricum does not have the enzymes needed for using maltose or starch. Two extracellular α-glucosidases encoded by agluI and agluII from Clostridium acetobutylicum ATCC 824 catalyzing the hydrolysis of α-1,4-glycosidic bonds in maltose and starch from the non-reducing end were cloned and expressed in C. tyrobutyricum (Δack, adhE2), and their effects on n-butanol production from maltose and soluble starch in batch fermentations were studied. Compared to the parental strain grown on glucose, mutants expressing agluI showed robust activity in breaking down maltose and produced more butanol (17.2 vs. 9.5 g/L) with a higher butanol yield (0.20 vs. 0.10 g/g) and productivity (0.29 vs. 0.16 g/L h). The mutant was also able to use soluble starch as substrate, although at a slower rate compared to maltose. Compared to C. acetobutylicum ATCC 824, the mutant produced more butanol from maltose (17.2 vs. 11.2 g/L) and soluble starch (16.2 vs. 8.8 g/L) in batch fermentations. The mutant was stable in batch fermentation without adding antibiotics, achieving a high butanol productivity of 0.40 g/L h. This mutant strain thus can be used in industrial production of n-butanol from maltose and soluble starch.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported in part by the National Science Foundation STTR program (IIP-1026648).

Compliance with ethical standards

This research does not involve human participants or animals.

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The authors declare no conflict of interests.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. William G. Lowrie Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, The Ohio State University, 151 West Woodruff Ave, Columbus, OH, 43210, USA

    Le Yu, Mengmeng Xu & Shang-Tian Yang

  2. Bioprocessing Innovative Company, 4734 Bridle Path Ct, Dublin, OH, 43017, USA

    I-Ching Tang

Authors
  1. Le Yu
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  2. Mengmeng Xu
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  3. I-Ching Tang
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  4. Shang-Tian Yang
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Correspondence to Shang-Tian Yang.

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Yu, L., Xu, M., Tang, IC. et al. Metabolic engineering of Clostridium tyrobutyricum for n-butanol production from maltose and soluble starch by overexpressing α-glucosidase. Appl Microbiol Biotechnol 99, 6155–6165 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00253-015-6680-4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00253-015-6680-4

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