合成功能菌群的构建及其工程化应用

Engineering microbial consortia through synthetic biology approach

摘要:

自然界中存在着大量的天然微生物群落，不同种群的微生物通过通信及分工拓展了单菌的性能边界，降低了整体的代谢负担并增加了对环境的适应性。合成生物学依据工程设计原理构建或改造基本功能元件、基因线路和底盘细胞，从而对生命的运行过程进行具有目的性的重新编程，获得丰富及可控的生物学功能。将这种工程设计的原理引入菌群，获得结构明确及功能可调的合成群落，可以为合成功能菌群的理论研究到应用提供思路及方法。本文回顾了近年来合成功能菌群领域的相关工作，对合成功能菌群的设计原则、构建方法以及应用进行详细介绍，并对未来的发展进行了展望。

Abstract:

There are a large number of natural microbial communities in nature. Different populations inside the consortia expand the performance boundary of a single microbial population through communication and division of labor, reducing the overall metabolic burden and increasing the environmental adaptability. Based on engineering principles, synthetic biology designs or modifies basic functional components, gene circuits, and chassis cells to purposefully reprogram the operational processes of the living cells, achieving rich and controllable biological functions. Introducing this engineering design principle to obtain structurally well-defined synthetic microbial communities can provide ideas for theoretical studies and shed light on versatile applications. This review discussed recent progresses on synthetic microbial consortia with regard to design principles, construction methods and applications, and prospected future perspectives.