title: Sucrose and Saccharomyces cerevisiae: a relationship most sweet.
abstract: Sucrose is an abundant, readily available and inexpensive substrate for industrial biotechnology processes and its use is demonstrated with much success in the production of fuel ethanol in Brazil. Saccharomyces cerevisiae, which naturally evolved to efficiently consume sugars such as sucrose, is one of the most important cell factories due to its robustness, stress tolerance, genetic accessibility, simple nutrient requirements and long history as an industrial workhorse. This minireview is focused on sucrose metabolism in S. cerevisiae, a rather unexplored subject in the scientific literature. An analysis of sucrose availability in nature and yeast sugar metabolism was performed, in order to understand the molecular background that makes S. cerevisiae consume this sugar efficiently. A historical overview on the use of sucrose and S. cerevisiae by humans is also presented considering sugarcane and sugarbeet as the main sources of this carbohydrate. Physiological aspects of sucrose consumption are compared with those concerning other economically relevant sugars. Also, metabolic engineering efforts to alter sucrose catabolism are presented in a chronological manner. In spite of its extensive use in yeast-based industries, a lot of basic and applied research on sucrose metabolism is imperative, mainly in fields such as genetics, physiology and metabolic engineering.
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemical Engineering, University of São Paulo, São Paulo-SP, 05424-970, Brazil School of Food Engineering, University of Campinas, Campinas-SP, 13083-862, Brazil.
authors.forename: Wesley Leoricy
authors.initials: WL
authors.lastname: Marques
authors.affiliation: School of Food Engineering, University of Campinas, Campinas-SP, 13083-862, Brazil.
authors.forename: Vijayendran
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Raghavendran
authors.affiliation: Department of Biochemistry, Federal University of Santa Catarina, Florianópolis-SC, 88040-900, Brazil.
authors.forename: Boris Ugarte
authors.initials: BU
authors.lastname: Stambuk
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemical Engineering, University of São Paulo, São Paulo-SP, 05424-970, Brazil School of Food Engineering, University of Campinas, Campinas-SP, 13083-862, Brazil gombert@unicamp.br.
authors.forename: Andreas Karoly
authors.initials: AK
authors.lastname: Gombert
mesh_terms: D001709:Biotechnology / Q000379:methods; D001938:Brazil; D000431:Ethanol / Q000378:metabolism; D006801:Humans; D007218:Industrial Microbiology / Q000379:methods; D060847:Metabolic Engineering / Q000379:methods; D053858:Metabolic Networks and Pathways / Q000235:genetics*; D012441:Saccharomyces cerevisiae / Q000254:growth & development / Q000378:metabolism / Q000502:physiology*; D013395:Sucrose / Q000378:metabolism*
chemical_list: D000431:Ethanol; D013395:Sucrose
keywords: Saccharomyces cerevisiae; metabolic engineering; sucrose; sugar metabolism; sugarcane; yeast biotechnology; yeast physiology