Since Pseudomonas aeruginosa is capable of biosynthesis of polyhydroxyalkanoic acid (PHA) and rhamnolipids, which contain lipid moieties that are derived from fatty acid biosynthesis, we investigated various fab mutants from P. aeruginosa with respect to biosynthesis of PHAs and rhamnolipids. All isogenic fabA, fabB, fabI, rhlG, and phaG mutants from P. aeruginosa showed decreased PHA accumulat...

The substrate specificity of polyhydroxyalkanoate (PHA) synthase 1 (PhaC1(Pp), class II) from Pseudomonas putida GPo1 (formerly known as Pseudomonas oleovorans GPo1) was successfully altered by localized semirandom mutagenesis. The enzyme evolution system introduces multiple point mutations, designed on the basis of the conserved regions of the PHA synthase family, by using PCR-based gene fragm...

Environmental microbes oscillate between feast and famine and need to carefully manage utilization, storage and conversion of reserve products to exploitable sources of carbon and energy. Polyhydroxyalkanoates (PHAs) are storage polymers that serve bacteria as sources of food materials under physiological conditions of carbon demand. In order to obtain insights into the role of PHA depolymerase...

BACKGROUND Halophilic bacteria have shown their significance in industrial production of polyhydroxyalkanoates (PHA) and are gaining more attention for genetic engineering modification. Yet, little information on the genomics and PHA related genes from halophilic bacteria have been disclosed so far. RESULTS The draft genome of moderately halophilic bacterium, Halomonas sp. TD01, a strain of g...

The purple nonsulfur alphaproteobacterium Rhodospirillum rubrum S1 was genetically engineered to synthesize a heteropolymer of mainly 3-hydroxydecanoic acid and 3-hydroxyoctanoic acid [P(3HD-co-3HO)] from CO- and CO2-containing artificial synthesis gas (syngas). For this, genes from Pseudomonas putida KT2440 coding for a 3-hydroxyacyl acyl carrier protein (ACP) thioesterase (phaG), a medium-cha...

The class II PHA (polyhydroxyalkanoate) synthases [PHA(MCL) synthases (medium-chain-length PHA synthases)] are mainly found in pseudomonads and catalyse synthesis of PHA(MCL)s using CoA thioesters of medium-chain-length 3-hydroxy fatty acids (C6-C14) as a substrate. Only recently PHA(MCL) synthases from Pseudomonas oleovorans and Pseudomonas aeruginosa were purified and in vitro activity was ac...

The second issue of Molecular Biotechnology offers us a variety of interesting topics ranging from basic science to industrial applications. The current strength of the field and this new journal come into conjunction when we verify how close new genomic tools and commonly used products really are. Indeed, it would not be outrageous to say that we can taste the flavours and sense the aroma of m...