title: Metabolic engineering for the production of hydrocarbon fuels.
abstract: Biofuels have been attracting increasing attention to provide a solution to the problems of climate change and our dependence on limited fossil oil. During the last decade, metabolic engineering has been performed to develop superior microorganisms for the production of so called advanced biofuels. Among the advanced biofuels, hydrocarbons possess high-energy content and superior fuel properties to other biofuels, and thus have recently been attracting much research interest. Here we review the recent advances in the microbial production of hydrocarbon fuels together with the metabolic engineering strategies employed to develop their production strains. Strategies employed for the production of long-chain and short-chain hydrocarbons derived from fatty acid metabolism along with the isoprenoid-derived hydrocarbons are reviewed. Also, the current limitations and future prospects in hydrocarbon-based biofuel production are discussed.
authors.affiliation: Metabolic and Biomolecular Engineering National Research Laboratory, Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering (BK21 Plus Program), BioProcess Engineering Research Center, and Center for Systems and Synthetic Biotechnology, Institute for the BioCentury Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST), 291 Daehak-ro, Yuseong-gu, Daejeon 305-701, Republic of Korea; Bioinformatics Research Center, KAIST, 291 Daehak-ro, Yuseong-gu, Daejeon 305-701, Republic of Korea. Electronic address: leesy@kaist.ac.kr.
authors.forename: Sang Yup
authors.initials: SY
authors.lastname: Lee
authors.affiliation: Metabolic and Biomolecular Engineering National Research Laboratory, Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering (BK21 Plus Program), BioProcess Engineering Research Center, and Center for Systems and Synthetic Biotechnology, Institute for the BioCentury Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST), 291 Daehak-ro, Yuseong-gu, Daejeon 305-701, Republic of Korea.
authors.forename: Hye Mi
authors.initials: HM
authors.lastname: Kim
authors.affiliation: Metabolic and Biomolecular Engineering National Research Laboratory, Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering (BK21 Plus Program), BioProcess Engineering Research Center, and Center for Systems and Synthetic Biotechnology, Institute for the BioCentury Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST), 291 Daehak-ro, Yuseong-gu, Daejeon 305-701, Republic of Korea.
authors.forename: Seungwoo
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Cheon
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D056804:Biofuels; D057231:Climate Change; D006801:Humans; D006838:Hydrocarbons / Q000378:metabolism*; D060847:Metabolic Engineering
chemical_list: D056804:Biofuels; D006838:Hydrocarbons