Advances and challenges in genetic engineering of microalgae

Abstract

Knowledge at the molecular level of microalgae has obtained great scientific interest in recent years, because of their potential for biofuel production, as well as other highly valued molecules. Recent advances in the area of the genetic manipulation of microalgae open an entirely new field of possible applications for these organisms as biorefineries. This review represents a compendium that gathers the main milestones that have marked the area of genetic engineering in microalgae during the last decade, from classical techniques for the transformation and expression of transgenes, to the most avant‐garde techniques currently used for gene silencing and DNA edition, as well as a discussion about the future perspectives in this field.

Bioengineering of Microalgae: Recent Advances, Perspectives, and Regulatory Challenges for Industrial Application

“…In addition, the constitutive expression of the transgene negatively impacts the growth of the transgenic algae as an extra metabolic burden. Therefore, the use of inducible promoter to tightly regulate the expression of transgene could be the better strategy to improve the growth efficiency, and hence the productivity of desired product (Fajardo et al, 2020 ). The various promoters used so far in the microalgal research are given in Table 3 .…”

Microalgae: Molecular Biology, Proteomics and Applications

“…The improvement of the production of microalgae and their bioactive compounds is an active research field, that is being achieved throughout several approaches. These approaches look for increase efficiency and economic returns as well as new microalgae applications and their biomass valorization in the context of circular economy and Blue Growth [13,18,26,48,49].…”

“…In Synechococcus sp. PCC 7002 improvement of lactate production was achieved by glutamine synthetase (glnA) repression via CRISPRi [18,65].…”

“…This is reflected in the amount of current research about the potential use of microalgae, which addresses alternative energy production, cancer treatment, agri-food sector, the removal of diverse contaminants from the environment and developments in the aquaculture sector [5][6][7]. Microalgae products cover different types of metabolites such as proteins, lipids or carbohydrates, that are employed in animal feed additives, human nutritional supplements, cosmetics and energy [8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18].…”

Marine Bacteria versus Microalgae: Who Is the Best for Biotechnological Production of Bioactive Compounds with Antioxidant Properties and Other Biological Applications?

“…Commonly, microalgae contain 40-70% proteins; 12-30% carbohydrates; 4-20% lipids; 8-14% carotene; and considerable amounts of vitamins B1, B2, B3, B6, B12, E, K, and D [59,71]. Production of potentially marketable compounds such as β-carotene; astaxanthin; polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA) such as docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) and eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA); and polysaccharides such as β-glucan, sterols, chlorophylls, and phycobiliproteins account for the therapeutic and nutritional supplements derived from microalgae [41,72]. Various properties of an alga species such as size, shape, toxicity, and digestibility determine its nutritional value [70].…”