SCI和EI收录∣中国化工学会会刊

中国化学工程学报 ›› 2021, Vol. 29 ›› Issue (2): 112-120.DOI: 10.1016/j.cjche.2020.12.012

• Synthetic Biotechnology and Metabolic Engineering • 上一篇    下一篇

Insights into constructing a stable and efficient microbial consortium

Chunmeng Xu1,2, Huimin Yu1,2,3   

  1. 1 Key Laboratory of Industrial Biocatalysis, Ministry of Education, Beijing 100084, China;
    2 Department of Chemical Engineering, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China;
    3 Center for Synthetic and Systems Biology, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China
  • 收稿日期:2020-10-17 修回日期:2020-12-04 出版日期:2021-02-28 发布日期:2021-05-15
  • 通讯作者: Huimin Yu
  • 基金资助:
    This work was supported by the National Key R&D Program of China (2018YFA0902200) and National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 21776157; No.22078173).

Insights into constructing a stable and efficient microbial consortium

Chunmeng Xu1,2, Huimin Yu1,2,3   

  1. 1 Key Laboratory of Industrial Biocatalysis, Ministry of Education, Beijing 100084, China;
    2 Department of Chemical Engineering, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China;
    3 Center for Synthetic and Systems Biology, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China
  • Received:2020-10-17 Revised:2020-12-04 Online:2021-02-28 Published:2021-05-15
  • Contact: Huimin Yu
  • Supported by:
    This work was supported by the National Key R&D Program of China (2018YFA0902200) and National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 21776157; No.22078173).

摘要: Microbial consortia are ubiquitous in nature, in which multiple microbial species cooperate to complete some important tasks such as lignocellulose degradation. Because of the advantages such as reduced metabolic burden and robustness to environment disturbances, developing a microbial consortium is a promising approach for valuable product synthesis, lignocellulose utilization, human health care, bioremediation and sustainable energy, etc. Despite the benefits, however, most artificial microbial consortia confront the problems of instability and low efficiency due to growth competition and metabolite incompatibility. To overcome these challenges, multiple strategies to design efficient synthetic microbial consortia have been reported. In this review, the interactions that determine the stability and performance of microbial consortia were described. Progress of artificial microbial consortia research was summarized, and the key strategies i.e., spatial or temporal segregation, separated utilization of nutrients, nutrient cross-feeding and division of labor, that will be of great importance for achieving a stable and efficient microbial consortium were highlighted. Two novel advanced tools, signaling molecule systems and computational models, were also introduced and discussed. We believed that combining the universal cell–cell signaling molecule systems with computational models will be promising for synthetic microbial consortia construction in the future.

关键词: Synthetic microbial consortia, Stability, Efficiency, Interactions, Advanced approaches, Signaling molecule systems

Abstract: Microbial consortia are ubiquitous in nature, in which multiple microbial species cooperate to complete some important tasks such as lignocellulose degradation. Because of the advantages such as reduced metabolic burden and robustness to environment disturbances, developing a microbial consortium is a promising approach for valuable product synthesis, lignocellulose utilization, human health care, bioremediation and sustainable energy, etc. Despite the benefits, however, most artificial microbial consortia confront the problems of instability and low efficiency due to growth competition and metabolite incompatibility. To overcome these challenges, multiple strategies to design efficient synthetic microbial consortia have been reported. In this review, the interactions that determine the stability and performance of microbial consortia were described. Progress of artificial microbial consortia research was summarized, and the key strategies i.e., spatial or temporal segregation, separated utilization of nutrients, nutrient cross-feeding and division of labor, that will be of great importance for achieving a stable and efficient microbial consortium were highlighted. Two novel advanced tools, signaling molecule systems and computational models, were also introduced and discussed. We believed that combining the universal cell–cell signaling molecule systems with computational models will be promising for synthetic microbial consortia construction in the future.

Key words: Synthetic microbial consortia, Stability, Efficiency, Interactions, Advanced approaches, Signaling molecule systems