BACKGROUND Microalgae have been demonstrated to be among the most promising phototrophic species for producing renewable biofuels and chemicals. Ethanol and butanol are clean energy sources with good chemical and physical properties as alternatives to gasoline. However, biosynthesis of these two biofuels has not been achieved due to low tolerance of algal cells to ethanol or butanol. RESULTS ...

n-Butanol has several favourable properties as an advanced fuel or a platform chemical. Bio-based production of n-butanol is becoming increasingly important for sustainable chemical industry. Synthesis of n-butanol can be achieved via more than one metabolic pathway. Here we report the metabolic engineering of Saccharomyces cerevisiae to produce n-butanol through a synergistic pathway: the endo...

BACKGROUND Recent efforts demonstrated the potential application of cyanobacteria as a "microbial cell factory" to produce butanol directly from CO2. However, cyanobacteria have very low tolerance to the toxic butanol, which limits the economic viability of this renewable system. RESULTS Through a long-term experimental evolution process, we achieved a 150% increase of the butanol tolerance i...

2-Butanol and its chemical precursor butanone (methyl ethyl ketone--MEK) are chemicals with potential uses as biofuels and biocommodity chemicals. In order to produce 2-butanol, we have demonstrated the utility of using a TEV-protease based expression system to achieve equimolar expression of the individual subunits of the two protein complexes involved in the B12-dependent dehydratase step (fr...

Pt and PtSn catalysts were studied for n-butanol electro-oxidation at various temperatures. PtSn showed a higher activity towards butanol electro-oxidation compared to Pt in acidic media. The onset potential for n-butanol oxidation on PtSn is ∼520 mV lower than that found on Pt, and significantly lower activation energy was found for PtSn compared with that for Pt.

The use of alkyl levulinates is growing interest in fuels. Adding n-butyl levulinate (BL) to fuels presents some benefits compared ethyl levulinate. conventional production route BL from the esterification levulinic acid, but latter compound corrosion issues. Alcoholysis fructose by butanol over cation exchange resins (solid catalyst) seems be a better alternative. effect water addition, solven...

n-Butanol was produced continuously in a two-stage fermentor system with integrated product removal from a co-feed of n-butyric acid and glucose. Glucose was always required as a source of ATP and electrons for the conversion of n-butyrate to n-butanol and for biomass growth; for the latter it also served as a carbon source. The first stage generated metabolically active planktonic cells of Clo...

Adapted Pseudomonas putida strains grew in the presence of up to 6% (vol/vol) butanol, the highest reported butanol concentration tolerated by a microbe. P. putida might be an alternative host for biobutanol production, overcoming the primary limitation of currently used strains-insufficient product titers due to low butanol tolerance.

Oligodeoxynucleotides are among the most useful tools in modem molecular biology. Phosphoramidite-synthesized oligonucleotides require a final reaction step with concentrated ammonia to effect their complete deprotection. The resulting organic by-products, e.g. benzamides, need to be removed from the oligonucleotides before the latter may be used in various enzymatic processes (1). Typically, t...

The isolation of Clostridium beijerinckii mutants that are more tolerant of butanol than the wild-type offered the opportunity to investigate whether the membrane activities which are required for maintaining the transmembrane DeltapH (the difference in pH between the cellular interior and exterior) are sensitive targets of butanol toxicity. The DeltapH was measured by the accumulation of [14C]...