Transfer of disulfide bond formation modules via yeast artificial chromosomes promotes the expression of heterologous proteins in Kluyveromyces marxianus

  • Pingping Wu 1,2 ,
  • Wenjuan Mo 1,2 ,
  • Tian Tian 1,2 ,
  • Kunfeng Song 1,2 ,
  • Yilin Lyu 1,2 ,
  • Haiyan Ren 1,2 ,
  • Jungang Zhou 1,2 ,
  • Yao Yu , 1,2 ,
  • Hong Lu , 1,2
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  • 1. State Key Laboratory of Genetic Engineering, School of Life Sciences, Fudan University, Shanghai, China.
  • 2. Shanghai Engineering Research Center of Industrial Microorganisms, Shanghai, China.
yaoyu@fudan.edu.cn
honglv@fudan.edu.cn

Received date: 27 Oct 2023

Accepted date: 23 Dec 2023

Copyright

2024 2024 The Authors. mLife published by John Wiley & Sons Australia, Ltd on behalf of Institute of Microbiology, Chinese Academy of Sciences.

Abstract

Kluyveromyces marxianus is a food-safe yeast with great potential for producing heterologous proteins. Improving the yield in K. marxianus remains a challenge and incorporating large-scale functional modules poses a technical obstacle in engineering. To address these issues, linear and circular yeast artificial chromosomes of K. marxianus (KmYACs) were constructed and loaded with disulfide bond formation modules from Pichia pastoris or K. marxianus. These modules contained up to seven genes with a maximum size of 15 kb. KmYACs carried telomeres either from K. marxianus or Tetrahymena. KmYACs were transferred successfully into K. marxianus and stably propagated without affecting the normal growth of the host, regardless of the type of telomeres and configurations of KmYACs. KmYACs increased the overall expression levels of disulfide bond formation genes and significantly enhanced the yield of various heterologous proteins. In high-density fermentation, the use of KmYACs resulted in a glucoamylase yield of 16.8 g/l, the highest reported level to date in K. marxianus. Transcriptomic and metabolomic analysis of cells containing KmYACs suggested increased flavin adenine dinucleotide biosynthesis, enhanced flux entering the tricarboxylic acid cycle, and a preferred demand for lysine and arginine as features of cells overexpressing heterologous proteins. Consistently, supplementing lysine or arginine further improved the yield. Therefore, KmYAC provides a powerful platform for manipulating large modules with enormous potential for industrial applications and fundamental research. Transferring the disulfide bond formation module via YACs proves to be an efficient strategy for improving the yield of heterologous proteins, and this strategy may be applied to optimize other microbial cell factories.

Cite this article

Pingping Wu , Wenjuan Mo , Tian Tian , Kunfeng Song , Yilin Lyu , Haiyan Ren , Jungang Zhou , Yao Yu , Hong Lu . Transfer of disulfide bond formation modules via yeast artificial chromosomes promotes the expression of heterologous proteins in Kluyveromyces marxianus[J]. mLife, 2024 , 3(1) : 129 -142 . DOI: 10.1002/mlf2.12115

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