(September 24, 2015) Duplicate
copies of genes safeguard survival of the biotech yeast Pichia pastoris in
environments where only methanol is present as feed. A recently elucidated
metabolism is similar to that used by plants for the utilization of carbon
dioxide.
Yeast is being used by mankind for longer time than any
other microorganism. Bread, beer, wine – all of these could not be produced
without Saccharomyces cerevisiae (baker’s yeast) and other yeast species. Over
the last decades yeast has become indispensable for industrial biotechnology as
a reliable cell factory. Valuable products ranging from enzymes to active
pharmaceutical ingredients are industrially produced using yeast, mostly by a
species called Pichia pastoris that is particularly productive.
Because of its long and varied use, yeast is one of the best
studied organisms. Besides its industrial application Pichia pastoris is also
used by scientists as a model organism for studying cell structures. Everything
seemed familiar – until this year. Researchers of the Austrian Centre of
Industrial Biotechnology (acib) and the University of Natural Resources and
Life Sciences Vienna (BOKU) have elucidated a new pathway that makes the yeast
Pichia pastoris unique. “We were able to show that the assumptions and models
that have been used in the last 30 years are not right”, explains Prof.
Diethard Mattanovich (BOKU and head of the research area “Systems Biology &
Microbial Cell Engineering” at acib).