In Silico Identification of Microbial Partners to Form Consortia with Anaerobic Fungi

摘要: Lignocellulose is an abundant and renewable resource that holds great promise for sustainable bioprocessing. However, unpretreated lignocellulose recalcitrant to direct utilization by most microbes. Current methods overcome this barrier include expensive pretreatment steps liberate cellulose hemicellulose from lignin. Anaerobic gut fungi possess complex cellulolytic machinery specifically evolved decompose crude lignocellulose, but they are not yet genetically tractable have been employed in industrial bioprocesses. Here, we aim exploit the biomass-degrading abilities of anaerobic pairing them with another organism can convert fermentable sugars generated hydrolysis into bioproducts. By combining experiments measuring amount excess released fungal enzymes acting on a novel dynamic flux balance analysis algorithm, screened potential consortia partners qualitative suitability. Microbial growth simulations reveal fungus Anaeromyces robustus suited pair either bacterium Clostridia ljungdahlii or methanogen Methanosarcina barkeri—both organisms also found rumen microbiome. capitalizing screen six alternative organisms, valuable experimental time saved towards identifying stable consortium members. This approach readily generalizable larger systems allows one rationally select partner microbes formation non-model like fungi.