Features
Visit to 4th Symposium on Microbial Lipids and Graz University of Technology's Institute of Molecular Biotechnology
06 Mar 2024
Dr. Simon Congqiang Zhang, Principal Scientist, recently spoke at the 4th Symposium on Microbial Lipids and Graz University of Technology's Institute of Molecular Biotechnology. He discussed producing lipids and terpenoids using engineered microbes, focusing on using C2 substrates like acetate and ethanol instead of glucose. His team achieved success in efficiently producing monoterpenes using acetate. At Graz University of Technology, he presented technology for biosynthesizing terpenoids at near theoretical yields, utilizing new terpene synthases in fungi and computational models. Their multidimensional heuristic process (MHP) fine-tunes biosynthetic pathways for high yields of molecules like linalool and geranyl acetate in E. coli. The technology is licensed for commercialization, with a focus on exploring CO2-derived acetate for food ingredient production.