Innovations for directed evolution of terpenoid synthases

Abstract:

Terpenoids are mostly existing compounds in natural products like plants and microorganisms. The application prospect of terpenoids attracts much attention owing to more and more valuable terpenoids discovered. However, limited yield and high extraction cost of terpenoids restrict their wide applications. The rise of synthetic biology has provided new ideas for biosynthesis of valuable terpenoids using targeted and high efficient microbial cell factories. Although terpenoid synthases are widely used as target enzymes in metabolic regulation of terpenoids biosynthesis, many natural terpenoid synthases have some disadvantages, such as insufficient catalytic activity, poor substrate specificity, poor regio-or stereoselectivity, poor stability and so on, which unfavorably affect the yield of terpenoids. To solve above problems, directed evolution of terpenoid synthases has been applied, which will have profound impact on biosynthesis of terpenoids by microbial cell factories. This review summarizes recent advances and their applications in directed evolution of enzymes. Meanwhile, the strategies for directed evolution of terpenoid synthases are proposed.