Table 1 Representative engineering strategies for carotenoid production from microbial hosts

Blakeslea trispora

Native producer of carotenoids,

β-Carotene 704.1 mg/L

Control of oxygen transfer rate

[19]

Lycopene, 256 mg/L

Optimization of fermentation with lycopene cyclase inhibitor

[21]

Escherichia coli

Genetically tractable, non-native producer

Lycopene, 0.5 g/g DCW

Regulation of lycopene synthesis pathway expression

[28]

β-Carotene, 2.1 g/L

Engineering MEP pathway for IPP and DMAPP supply and central pathway (TCA, PPP) for carbon flux

[31]

Saccharomyces cerevisiae

Genetically tractable, non-native producer

Lycopene, 56 mg/g DCW

Increase of acetyl-CoA pool and optimization of lycopene synthesis pathway via genome manipulation

[34]

Astaxanthin, 218 mg/L

Genome evolution by ARTP

[36]

Corynebacterium glutamicum

Native producer of C₅₀ carotenoid

β-Carotene, 7 mg/L

Deletion of crtR and integration of crt pathway genes

[40]

Rhodobacter sphaeroides

Phototroph with carotenogenic genes

Lycopene, 10 mg/g DCW

Replacement of crtI, augmentation of MEP pathway, and block of PPP pathway

[43]

Xanthophyllomyces dendrorhous

Astaxanthin producer

Zeaxanthin, 0.5 mg/g DCW

Mutagenesis of astaxanthin synthase and overexpression of β-carotene hydrolase

[47]

Yarrowia lipolytica

Genetically tractable, non-native producer

β-Carotene, 6.5 g/L

Optimization of promoter-gene pairs of heterologous crt pathway

[53]

β-Carotene, 4 g/L

Iterative integration of multiple-copy pathway genes

[52]