Metabolic engineering of Clostridium beijerinckii to improve glycerol metabolism and furfural tolerance

BACKGROUND: Inefficient utilization of glycerol by Clostridium beijerinckii (Cb) is a major impediment to adopting glycerol metabolism as a strategy for increasing NAD(P)H regeneration, which would in turn, alleviate the toxicity of lignocellulose-derived microbial inhibitory compounds (LDMICs, e.g., furfural), and improve the fermentation of lignocellulosic biomass hydrolysates (LBH) to butanol. To address this problem, we employed a metabolic engineering strategy to enhance glycerol utilization by Cb. RESULTS: By overexpressing two glycerol dehydrogenase (Gldh) genes (dhaD1 and gldA1) from the glycerol hyper-utilizing Clostridium pasteurianum (Cp) as a fused protein in Cb, we achieved approximately 43% increase in glycerol consumption, when compared to the plasmid control. Further, Cb_dhaD1 + gldA1 achieved a 59% increase in growth, while butanol and acetone–butanol–ethanol (ABE) concentrations and productivities increased 14.0%, 17.3%, and 55.6%, respectively, relative to the control. Co-expression of dhaD1 + gldA1 and gldA1 + dihydroxyacetone kinase (dhaK) resulted in significant payoffs in cell growth and ABE production compared to expression of one Gldh. In the presence of 4–6 g/L furfural, increased glycerol consumption by the dhaD1 + gldA1 strain increased cell growth (> 50%), the rate of furfural detoxification (up to 68%), and ABE production (up to 40%), relative to the plasmid control. Likewise, over-expression of [(dhaD1 + gldA1) dhaK] improved butanol and ABE production by 70% and 50%, respectively, in the presence of 5 and 6 g/L furfural relative to the plasmid control. CONCLUSIONS: Overexpression of Cp gldhs and dhaK in Cb significantly enhanced glycerol utilization, ABE production, and furfural tolerance by Cb. Future research will address the inability of recombinant Cb to metabolize glycerol as a sole substrate. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (10.1186/s13068-019-1388-9) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.