Chemically assisted microbial production of succinic acid by the yeast Yarrowia lipolytica grown on ethanol.

A new two-step process of production of succinic acid (SA) has been developed, which includes the microbial synthesis of alpha-ketoglutaric acid by the yeast Yarrowia lipolytica (step 1) and subsequent oxidation of the acid by hydrogen peroxide to SA (step 2). The maximum concentration of SA and its yield were found to be 63.4 g l(-1) and 58% of the ethanol consumed, respectively. The purity of the SA isolated from the culture liquid filtrate reached 100%. The yield of SA was as high as 82% of its amount in the culture liquid filtrate. The quality of the SA produced by the invented method meets the biochemical grade definitions, as is evident from the respiratory and other relevant parameters of rat liver mitochondria upon the oxidation of this SA.

Citric acid production patent review.

Current Review article summarizes the developments in citric acid production technologies in East and West last 100 years. Citric acid is commercially produced by large scale fermentation mostly using selected fungal or yeast strains in aerobe bioreactors and still remains one of the runners in industrial production of biotechnological bulk metabolites obtained by microbial fermentation since about 100 years, reflecting the historical development of modern biotechnology and fermentation process technology in East and West. Citric acid fermentation was first found as a fungal product in cultures of Penicillium glaucum on sugar medium by Wehmer in 1893. Citric acid is an important multifunctional organic acid with a broad range of versatile uses in household and industrial applications that has been produced industrially since the beginning of 20(th) century. There is a great worldwide demand for citric acid consumption due to its low toxicity, mainly being used as acidulant in pharmaceutical and food industries. Global citric acid production has reached 1.4 million tones, increasing annually at 3.5-4.0% in demand and consumption. Citric acid production by fungal submerged fermentation is still dominating, however new perspectives like solid-state processes or continuous yeast processes can be attractive for producers to stand in today's strong competition in industry. Further perspectives aiming in the improvement of citric acid production are the improvement of citric acid producing strains by classical and modern mutagenesis and selection as well as downstream processes. Many inexpensive by-products and residues of the agro-industry (e.g. molasses, glycerin etc.) can be economically utilized as substrates in the production of citric acid, especially in solid-state fermentation, enormously reducing production costs and minimizing environmental problems. Alternatively, continuous processes utilizing yeasts which reach 200-250 g/l citric acid can stand in today's strong competition in citric acid industry and replace the traditional discontinuous fungi processes.

Evolution of glyoxylate cycle enzymes in Metazoa: evidence of multiple horizontal transfer events and pseudogene formation.

BACKGROUND: The glyoxylate cycle is thought to be present in bacteria, protists, plants, fungi, and nematodes, but not in other Metazoa. However, activity of the glyoxylate cycle enzymes, malate synthase (MS) and isocitrate lyase (ICL), in animal tissues has been reported. In order to clarify the status of the MS and ICL genes in animals and get an insight into their evolution, we undertook a comparative-genomic study. RESULTS: Using sequence similarity searches, we identified MS genes in arthropods, echinoderms, and vertebrates, including platypus and opossum, but not in the numerous sequenced genomes of placental mammals. The regions of the placental mammals' genomes expected to code for malate synthase, as determined by comparison of the gene orders in vertebrate genomes, show clear similarity to the opossum MS sequence but contain stop codons, indicating that the MS gene became a pseudogene in placental mammals. By contrast, the ICL gene is undetectable in animals other than the nematodes that possess a bifunctional, fused ICL-MS gene. Examination of phylogenetic trees of MS and ICL suggests multiple horizontal gene transfer events that probably went in both directions between several bacterial and eukaryotic lineages. The strongest evidence was obtained for the acquisition of the bifunctional ICL-MS gene from an as yet unknown bacterial source with the corresponding operonic organization by the common ancestor of the nematodes. CONCLUSION: The distribution of the MS and ICL genes in animals suggests that either they encode alternative enzymes of the glyoxylate cycle that are not orthologous to the known MS and ICL or the animal MS acquired a new function that remains to be characterized. Regardless of the ultimate solution to this conundrum, the genes for the glyoxylate cycle enzymes present a remarkable variety of evolutionary events including unusual horizontal gene transfer from bacteria to animals.

Evidence of the glyoxylate cycle in the liver of newborn rats.

BACKGROUND: It is generally accepted that the glyoxylate cycle exists in microorganisms and higher plants but absent in higher animals. the hypodhesis of the glyoxylate cycle in the tissues of higher animals with a high level of physiological activity was first proposed by Kondrashova and Rodionova in 1971. The goal of this work was yo verifv this in newborn rats, which possess a 2.5-fold hygher physiological activity and oxygen consumption rate than adult rats. MATERIAL/METHODS: Newborn (7-day-old) anradult 1 ats were used for this experiment. The activities of the key enzymes of the glyoxylate cocle (isecitrate lyse and nmalate synthase) were measured by HPLC and spectroscopic methods. The activities of isocitrate lyase and malate synthase were found in the liver homogenates prepared from newborn rats, but not from adult rats. The activities of the enzymes common to both the Krebs cycle and the glyoxylate cycle (citrate synthase, aconitase, and malate dehydrogenase) were 20-40% higher in newborn than in adult rats. CONCLUSIONS: These data indicate the existence of the glyoxylate cycle in animal tissues.