Yeast as a promising heterologous host for steroid bioproduction

Abstract

With the rapid development of synthetic biology and metabolic engineering technologies, yeast has been generally considered as promising hosts for the bioproduction of secondary metabolites. Sterols are essential components of cell membrane, and are the precursors for the biosynthesis of steroid hormones, signaling molecules, and defense molecules in the higher eukaryotes, which are of pharmaceutical and agricultural significance. In this mini-review, we summarize the recent engineering efforts of using yeast to synthesize various steroids, and discuss the structural diversity that the current steroidproducing yeast can achieve, the challenge and the potential of using yeast as the bioproduction platform of various steroids from higher eukaryotes.

Amino acid–derived defense metabolites from plants: A potential source to facilitate novel antimicrobial development

“…Pseudoalkaloids include the steroidal alkaloids of the Solanaceae family and glycoalkaloids. The identification of biosynthetic genes for steroidal alkaloids ( 218 , 219 ) and the optimization of yeast platforms ( 220 ) allow for the customization and biotechnological production of these molecules.…”

A yeast chemogenomic screen identifies pathways that modulate adipic acid toxicity

“…For example the activity of Pdr5, an ABC transporter reported to increase yeast tolerance to certain stresses, is impaired in ergosterol biosynthesis mutants ( Kodedová and Sychrová, 2015 ). Similarly, ergosterol has been shown to be required for Pdr12 function, which is essential for tolerance to organic acids ( Xu and Li, 2020 ). Yeast mutants that lack genes in the ergosterol biosynthesis pathway are sensitive not only to adipic acid but also to other organic acids such as sorbic acid ( Mollapour et al., 2004 ).…”

From Sugars to Nutritional Products - Active Ingredients

“…In addition to these animal sources, yeast has been recognized as a promising microorganism for cholesterol derived steroid bioproduction. [27] For the synthesis of vitamin D 3 , 7-dehydrocholesterol (7-DHC) is an important intermediate which after UV-radiation delivers vitamin D 3 as further described below. In 2002 BASF reported on 7-DHC production using a recombinant yeast which contained human and mouse C-8 sterol isomerase, C-5 sterol desaturase and a sterol reductase together with deleted sterol-24-methyltransferase and sterol-22-desaturase genes based on the simplified ERG pathway shown in Scheme 6.…”