Engineering synergy in biotechnology

Jens Nielsen; Martin Fussenegger; Jay Keasling; Sang Yup Lee; James C Liao; Kristala Prather; Bernhard Palsson

doi:10.1038/nchembio.1519

Engineering synergy in biotechnology

Nat Chem Biol. 2014 May;10(5):319-22. doi: 10.1038/nchembio.1519.

Authors

Jens Nielsen¹, Martin Fussenegger², Jay Keasling³, Sang Yup Lee⁴, James C Liao⁵, Kristala Prather⁶, Bernhard Palsson⁷

Affiliations

¹ 1] Novo Nordisk Foundation Center for Biosustainability, Technical University of Denmark, Hørsholm, Denmark. [2] Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, Chalmers University of Technology, Gothenburg, Sweden, and the Science for Life Laboratory, Royal Institute of Technology, Solna, Sweden.
² ETH Zurich, Department of Biosystems Science and Engineering, Basel, Switzerland.
³ 1] Novo Nordisk Foundation Center for Biosustainability, Technical University of Denmark, Hørsholm, Denmark. [2] Joint Bioenergy Institute, Emeryville, California, USA, the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering and the Department of Bioengineering, University of California-Berkeley, Berkeley, California, USA, the Physical Biosciences Division, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, California, USA, and the Synthetic Biology Engineering Research Center (SynBERC), Berkeley, California, USA.
⁴ 1] Novo Nordisk Foundation Center for Biosustainability, Technical University of Denmark, Hørsholm, Denmark. [2] Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, KAIST, Daejeon, Korea.
⁵ Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, University of California-Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California, USA.
⁶ 1] Department of Chemical Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA. [2] Synthetic Biology Engineering Research Center (SynBERC), Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA.
⁷ 1] Novo Nordisk Foundation Center for Biosustainability, Technical University of Denmark, Hørsholm, Denmark. [2] Department of Bioengineering, University of California-San Diego, La Jolla, California, USA.

PMID: 24743245
DOI: 10.1038/nchembio.1519

Abstract

Biotechnology is a central focus in efforts to provide sustainable solutions for the provision of fuels, chemicals and materials. On the basis of a recent open discussion, we summarize the development of this field, highlighting the distinct but complementary approaches provided by metabolic engineering and synthetic biology for the creation of efficient cell factories to convert biomass and other feedstocks to desired chemicals.

Publication types

Review

MeSH terms

Biomass
Biotechnology*
Metabolic Engineering*