C3-C4 platform chemicals bioproduction using biomass

Abstract

Platform chemicals composed of 3-4 carbons are group of chemicals that can be used as important precursors for making a variety of chemicals and materials, including solvents, fuels, polymers, pharmaceuticals, perfumes, and foods. At present, most of the commercial platform chemicals composed of 3-4 carbons are produced from petroleum-based products. However, fossil-derived resources are nonrenewable and their amount is increasingly depleting. Additionally, application of these materials has number of environmental concerns. To overcome these problems, increasing interest has focused on the development of sustainable technologies for producing these platform chemicals from renewable resources. Researchers have made significant progress in biological production using metabolic of platform chemicals using engineering-modified microorganisms. However, the production efficiency still needs to be improved for it to become economically viable. Further work on engineering these strains and exploring their tolerances and the use of low-cost renewable substrate like biomass may increase the yields of green platform chemicals to an industrial scale. In this review we focused on the current status of the bio-based production of major C3-C4 platform chemicals, by direct microbial bioconversion of renewable materials.