Combined engineering approaches for increased 2,3-butanediol production

The transition to a low carbon, bio-based economy is dependent upon our ability to produce speciality and platform chemicals efficiently from microorganisms via industrial biotechnology. This multidisciplinary project will develop a novel, improved and holistically engineered process for the microbial production of 2,3-butanediol. 23BD is currently obtained via petrochemical processes and is an important platform chemical used for the production of methyl ethyl ketone, a solvent, and butadiene, which is in turn used in the production of synthetic rubber1,2. To address this challenge a joint synthetic biology and process engineering approach will be used to increase 23BD production by developing a scalable bioprocess. The research will focus on the following areas; 1 - Scalable bioreactor process design for 23BD production 2 - Strain modification based on measured bioreactor performance 3 - Process modelling and optimisation.

As a starting point this project will make use of previously developed 23BD producing S. cerevisiae strains3, which divert carbon to 23BD via acetoin due to an accumulation of pyruvate and acetaldehyde and apply a rigorous bioprocessing approach and experience of bioprocess design based on modified S. cerevisiae strains4,5 to test strain behaviour at in bioreactors and design a scalable fed batch/continuous 23BD production process. The increased knowledge of bioprocess design optimisation arising from this project will be applicable to industrial biotechnology across a broad range of systems.