Fig. 1: A synthetic P. putida consortium for simultaneous TPA and EG degradation.
From: Engineering microbial division of labor for plastic upcycling
a Schematic of the designer T-E consortium composed of two strains Pp-T and Pp-E. Pp-T specializes in TPA degradation, which was developed by deleting the ped operon and constitutively expressing the genes tpaAa, tpaAb, tpaB, tpaC, and tpaK. By contrast, Pp-E specializes in EG degradation, achieved by knocking out the gclR gene to boost the expression of the genes gcl, glxR, hyi, ttuD, and pykA and replacing the native promoter of the glcDEF operon with a strong constitutive promoter (Ptac). b–d Temporal profiles of substrate degradation and cell growth during TPA (b), EG (c), and TPA and EG mixture (d) fermentations by Pp-T. e–g Temporal profiles of substrate degradation and cell growth during TPA (e), EG (f), and TPA and EG (g) fermentations by Pp-E. h–j Temporal profiles of the TPA (h), EG (i), and TPA and EG (j) fermentations by the T-E consortium. The co-culture was inoculated at a 1:1 ratio. For panel a, blue text indicates overexpressed genes whereas red cross (‘×’) indicates the deletion of genes in dark gray. Experimental data are presented as mean values with standard deviations from three independent experiments. Source data are provided as a Source Data file.
