Title
Comparative Genomics of Xylose-Fermenting Fungi for Enhanced Biofuel Production
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
7-25-2011
Department
Biology
Language
English
Publication Title
PNAS (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America)
Abstract
Cellulosic biomass is an abundant and underused substrate for biofuel production. The inability of many microbes to metabolize the pentose sugars abundant within hemicellulose creates specific challenges for microbial biofuel production from cellulosic material. Although engineered strains of Saccharomyces cerevisiae can use the pentose xylose, the fermentative capacity pales in comparison with glucose, limiting the economic feasibility of industrial fermentations. To better understand xylose utilization for subsequent microbial engineering, we sequenced the genomes of two xylose-fermenting, beetle-associated fungi, Spathaspora passalidarum and Candida tenuis. To identify genes involved in xylose metabolism, we applied a comparative genomic approach across 14 Ascomycete genomes, mapping phenotypes and genotypes onto the fungal phylogeny, and measured genomic expression across five Hemiascomycete species with different xylose-consumption phenotypes. This approach implicated many genes and processes involved in xylose assimilation. Several of these genes significantly improved xylose utilization when engineered into S. cerevisiae, demonstrating the power of comparative methods in rapidly identifying genes for biomass conversion while reflecting on fungal ecology.
DOI
10.1073/pnas.1103039108
Recommended Citation
Wohlbach, Dana J., Alan Kuo, Trey K. Sato, Katlyn M. Potts, Asaf A. Salamov, Kurt M. LaButti, Hui Sun, Alicia Clum, Jasmyn L. Pangilinan, Erika A. Lindquist, Susan Lucas, Alla Lapidus, Mingjie Jin, Christa Gunawan, Venkatesh Balan, Bruce E. Dale, Thomas W. Jeffries, Robert Zinkel, Kerrie W. Barry, Igor V. Grigoriev, and Audrey P. Gasch. "Comparative Genomics of Xylose-Fermenting Fungi for Enhanced Biofuel Production." PNAS 108, no. 32 (2011): 13212-13217. https://www.pnas.org/content/108/32/13212
Comments
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