Recent advances in microbial polyhydroxyalkanoates文档.pdfVIP

Process Biochemistry 40 (2005) 607–619 Recent advances in microbial polyhydroxyalkanoates Shilpi Khanna, Ashok K. Srivastava∗ Department of Biochemical Engineering and Biotechnology, Indian Institute of Technology, Hauz Khas, New Delhi 110016, India Received 5 September 2003; accepted 26 January 2004 Abstract Polyhydroxyalkanoates (PHAs) are polyesters of hydroxyalkanoates (HAs) synthesised by numerous bacteria as an intracellular carbon and energy storage compound. These are accumulated in the cytoplasm of cells. A number of bacteria including Alcaligenes , Pseudomonas, recombinant Escherichia coli and methylotrophs have been used for the production of PHAs and high productivities have been achieved. Production of PHA by transgenic plants has been demonstrated on a laboratory-scale and large-scale production will be feasible in the near future. By controlling the monomer composition of PHA, it has been indicated that the physical properties of polymers can be regulated to a great extent. Even though PHAs have been recognised as a good candidate for biodegradable polymers, their high production cost limits their industrial application. It is hoped that with improvement in fermentation and downstream processing techniques, development of new recombinant strains and large-scale production by transgenic plants will reduce the cost of production of PHAs thereby making them competitive with conventional plastics. © 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Keywords: Polyhydroxyalkanoates; Polyhydroxybutyrate; Biodegradable; Fermentation; Transgenic plants; Recombinant E. coli 1. Introduction ditives such as pigments, coatings, fillers, limits the use