Approaches in the Photosynthetic Production of Sustainable Fuels by
Cyanobacteria using Tools of Synthetic Biology
Abstract
Cyanobacteria, photosynthetic prokaryotic microorganisms having a simple
genetic composition are the prospective photoautotrophic cell factories
for the production of a wide range of biofuel molecules. Simple genetic
composition of cyanobacteria allows effortless genetic manipulation
which leads to increased research endeavour from the synthetic biology
approach. An improved development of synthetic biology tools, genetic
modification methods and advancement in transformation techniques to
construct a strain which can contain multiple target genes in single
operon will vastly expand the functions that can be used for engineering
photosynthetic cyanobacteria for the generation of biofuels. In this
review, recent advancements and approaches in synthetic biology tools
and biofuel production by metabolically engineered cyanobacteria have
been discussed. Various fuel molecules like isoprene, limonene,
α-farnesene, squalene, alkanes, butanol and fatty acids which can be a
substitute of petroleum and fossil fuels in future have been elaborated.