An erythromycin process improvement using the diethyl methylmalonate-responsive (Dmr) phenotype of the Saccharopolyspora erythraea mutB strain

Reconstruction of the Genome-Scale Metabolic Model of Saccharopolyspora erythraea and Its Application in the Overproduction of Erythromycin

Saccharopolyspora erythraea is considered to be an effective host for erythromycin. However, little is known about the regulation in terms of its metabolism. To develop an accurate model-driven strategy for the efficient production of erythromycin, a genome-scale metabolic model (iJL1426) was reconstructed for the industrial strain. The final model included 1426 genes, 1858 reactions, and 1687 metabolites. The accurate rates of the growth predictions for the 27 carbon and 31 nitrogen sources available were 92.6% and 100%, respectively. Moreover, the simulation results were consistent with the physiological observation and ¹³C metabolic flux analysis obtained from the experimental data. Furthermore, by comparing the single knockout targets with earlier published results, four genes coincided within the range of successful knockouts. Finally, iJL1426 was used to guide the optimal addition strategy of n-propanol during industrial erythromycin fermentation to demonstrate its ability. The experimental results showed that the highest erythromycin titer was 1442.8 μg/mL at an n-propanol supplementation rate of 0.05 g/L/h, which was 45.0% higher than that without n-propanol supplementation, and the erythromycin-specific synthesis rate was also increased by 30.3%. Therefore, iJL1426 will lead to a better understanding of the metabolic capabilities and, thus, is helpful in a systematic metabolic engineering approach.

Engineering actinomycetes for biosynthesis of macrolactone polyketides

Actinobacteria are characterized as the most prominent producer of natural products (NPs) with pharmaceutical importance. The production of NPs from these actinobacteria is associated with particular biosynthetic gene clusters (BGCs) in these microorganisms. The majority of these BGCs include polyketide synthase (PKS) or non-ribosomal peptide synthase (NRPS) or a combination of both PKS and NRPS. Macrolides compounds contain a core macro-lactone ring (aglycone) decorated with diverse functional groups in their chemical structures. The aglycon is generated by megaenzyme polyketide synthases (PKSs) from diverse acyl-CoA as precursor substrates. Further, post-PKS enzymes are responsible for allocating the structural diversity and functional characteristics for their biological activities. Macrolides are biologically important for their uses in therapeutics as antibiotics, anti-tumor agents, immunosuppressants, anti-parasites and many more. Thus, precise genetic/metabolic engineering of actinobacteria along with the application of various chemical/biological approaches have made it plausible for production of macrolides in industrial scale or generation of their novel derivatives with more effective biological properties. In this review, we have discussed versatile approaches for generating a wide range of macrolide structures by engineering the PKS and post-PKS cascades at either enzyme or cellular level in actinobacteria species, either the native or heterologous producer strains.

The dynamic regulation of nitrogen and phosphorus in the early phase of fermentation improves the erythromycin production by recombinant Saccharopolyspora erythraea strain

Background

Erythromycin production often has concern with the consumption rate of amino nitrogen and phosphate, especially in the early fermentation phase. The dynamic regulation of nitrogen and phosphorus was put forward based on the comprehensive analysis of the contents of phosphorus and nitrogen in different nitrogen sources as well as the relations between nitrogen consumption and phosphorus consumption.

Results

Firstly, the unstable nitrogen source, corn steep liquor, was substituted with the stable nitrogen source, yeast powder, with little effects on erythromycin production. Secondly, feeding phosphate in the early fermentation stage accelerated the consumption of amino nitrogen and ultimately increased erythromycin production by approximately 24% as compared with the control (without feeding potassium dihydrogen phosphate). Thirdly, feeding phosphate strategy successfully applied to 500 L fermenter with the final erythromycin concentration of 11839 U/mL, which was 17.3% higher than that of the control. Finally, the application of condensed soy protein (a cheap nitrogen source with low phosphorus content) combined with phosphate feed strategy led to a 13.0% increase of the erythromycin production as compared with the control (condensed soy protein, without feeding potassium dihydrogen phosphate).

Conclusions

Appropriately feeding phosphate combined with rational nitrogen regulation in the early fermentation phase was an effective way to improve erythromycin production.

Significant decrease of broth viscosity and glucose consumption in erythromycin fermentation by dynamic regulation of ammonium sulfate and phosphate

In this study, the effects of nitrogen sources on broth viscosity and glucose consumption in erythromycin fermentation were investigated. By controlling ammonium sulfate concentration, broth viscosity and glucose consumption were decreased by 18.2% and 61.6%, respectively, whereas erythromycin biosynthesis was little affected. Furthermore, erythromycin A production was increased by 8.7% still with characteristics of low broth viscosity and glucose consumption through the rational regulations of phosphate salt, soybean meal and ammonium sulfate. It was found that ammonium sulfate could effectively control proteinase activity, which was correlated with the utilization of soybean meal as well as cell growth. The pollets formation contributed much to the decrease of broth viscosity. The accumulation of extracellular propionate and succinate under the new regulation strategy indicated that higher propanol consumption might increase the concentration of methylmalonyl-CoA and propionyl-CoA and thus could increase the flux leading to erythromycin A.

Controlling the feed rate of glucose and propanol for the enhancement of erythromycin production and exploration of propanol metabolism fate by quantitative metabolic flux analysis

In this paper, several different fermentation experiments were designed to address whether modulating glucose and propanol feeds could benefit the production level of erythromycin during pilot plant (30 L) fermentation. Results showed that glucose feed rate (determined by a set high or low culture pH) had no effect on erythromycin production, indicating that glucose was not the limiting factor for erythromycin biosynthesis under these conditions. It was found that decreasing glucose feed could stimulate the consumption of propanol, and the high erythromycin production (12.49 ± 0.50 mg ml⁻¹) was achieved by controlling the feed rates of glucose and propanol. The quantitative metabolic flux analysis disclosed that high propanol consumption increased the pool size of propionyl-CoA (~2.147 mmol g⁻¹ day⁻¹) and methylmalonyl-CoA (~1.708 mmol g⁻¹ day⁻¹). It was also found that 45-77 % of the propanol went into the TCA cycle which strengthened the conclusion that blocking the propionate pathway to TCA cycle could lead to a significant increase in erythromycin production in carbohydrate-based media (Reeves et al. Ind Microbiol Biotechnol 7:600-609, 2006). In addition, the results also suggested that a relative low intracellular ATP level resulting from low glucose feed did not limit the erythromycin biosynthesis, and a relatively high NADPH should be beneficial for erythromycin biosynthesis.