Elucidation and characterization of potential biological applications on non-model bacterial chassis

Abstract

Microorganisms play a fundamental role in the transition from an economy based on petrochemical processes to one based on sustainability, namely bioeconomy. Since the introduction of large-scale fermentative processes at the beginning of the 20th century, the accelerated growth in the field driven by next generation sequencing techniques, the increase in computational power for processing biological data and advanced genome editing techniques have allowed the development of synthetic gene circuits à la carte in various biotechnology sectors, such as the food, biofuel, textile or therapeutic industries. However, for the full adoption of microorganisms as platforms for the production of biomolecules to be competitive compared to those obtained by the petrochemical industry, several technological barriers must still be overcome. Thus, the effective implementation of sophisticated gene circuits demands chassis with physiological properties adapted to the molecular purposes of the design. The search for microorganisms or chassis with different biochemical properties and the development of appropriate molecular tools so that they can be manipulated, therefore, are two urgent goals for the consolidation of a sustainable industrial production paradigm based on bioprocesses. In the present proposal, the goal is to characterize new non-model chassis with potential use in synthetic biology in which soil bacteria will be isolated using cheap carbon sources. Thus, the genomes of 20 selected microorganism isolates will be characterized and their biotechnological potential will be elucidated, combining these characteristics with the performance of molecular tools on isolated bacteria.