Technological watch

Ferulic acid is a renewable chemical found in lignocellulose from grasses such as wheat straw and sugarcane. Pseudomonas putida is able to liberate and metabolise ferulic acid from plant biomass. Deletion of the hydroxycinnamoyl?CoA hydratase?lyase gene (ech) produced a strain of P. putida unable to utilise ferulic and p?coumaric acid, which was able to accumulate ferulic acid and p?coumaric acid from wheat straw or sugar cane bagasse. Further engineering of this strain saw the replacement of ech with the phenolic acid decarboxylase padC, which converts p?coumaric and ferulic acid into 4?vinylphenol and the flavour agent 4?vinylguaiacol, respectively. The engineered strain containing padC was able to generate 4?vinylguaiacol and 4?vinylphenol from media containing lignocellulose, or Green Value Protobind lignin as feedstock, and did not require the addition of an exogenous inducer molecule. Biopolymerisation of 4?vinylguaiacol and 4?vinylcatechol styrene products was also carried out, using Trametes versicolor laccase, to generate “biopolystyrene” materials on small scale.This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved