Highly selective isolation and characterization of Lipomyces starkeyi mutants with increased production of triacylglycerol.

Highly selective isolation and characterization of Lipomyces starkeyi mutants with increased production of triacylglycerol. Appl Microbiol Biotechnol. 2019 Jun 05;: Authors: Yamazaki H, Kobayashi S, Ebina S, Abe S, Ara S, Shida Y, Ogasawara W, Yaoi K, Araki H, Takaku H Abstract The oleaginous yeast Lipomyces starkeyi is an attractive organism for the industrial production of lipids; however, the amount of lipid produced by wild-type L. starkeyi is insufficient. The study aims to obtain L. starkeyi mutants that rapidly accumulate large amounts of triacylglycerol (TAG). Mutagenized yeast cells at the early stages of cultivation were subjected to Percoll density gradient centrifugation; cells with increased production of TAG were expected to be enriched in the resultant upper fraction because of their lower density. Among 120 candidates from the upper fractions, five mutants were isolated that accumulated higher amounts of TAG. Moreover, when omitting cells with mucoid colony morphology, 11 objective mutants from 11 candidates from the upper fraction were effectively (100%) isolated. Of total 16 mutants obtained, detailed characterization of five mutants was performed to reveal that five mutants achieved about 1.5-2.0 times TAG concentration (4.7-6.0 g/L) as compared with the wild-type strain (3.6 g/L) at day 5. Among these five mutants, strain E15 was the best for industrial use because only strain E15 showed significantly higher TAG...
Source: Applied Microbiology and Biotechnology - Category: Microbiology Authors: Tags: Appl Microbiol Biotechnol Source Type: research