Nitrogen is an essential element of life, and is one of the major nutrients limiting plant growth. To meet the increased food production demand in agriculture, chemical nitrogen requirements increase from year to year. Biological nitrogen fixation (BNF) plays an important role in agriculture. More than 60% of the fixed N on earth results from BNF. Associative nitrogen-fixing bacterium in major cereal crops is considered as one alternative in reducing the use of chemical nitrogen fertilizer. There has been a goal to increase biological nitrogen fixation and engineering such associations in non-legume crops to reduce the use of chemically derived fertilizer. The use of synthetic biology tools to boost biological nitrogen fixation has been considered as one of the best strategies to increase crop yield to face population growth and general agronomic crop demand. This review discusses the nitrogen fixation microorganisms, nitrogen-fixation island genes in associative nitrogen-fixing bacterium and nitrogen-fixing mechanisms. This review also elaborates on current research efforts involved in nitrogen fixation using synthetic biology tools. Moreover, this review also proposes new and emerging strategies to improve the nitrogenase activity and future perspectives in this research field.
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Xiaoshu Jing, Yan Ding, Xiaomei Han, Zhe Wang, Deyan Gao. Advances in synthetic biology of associated nitrogen-fixation bacteria. [J]. Acta Microbiologica Sinica, 2021, 61(10): 3026-3034