Biotechnological products and processes

Unit of Metabolic Engineering (C. Compagno)
Industrial microbiology: most used industrial microorganisms and cultivation strategies (batch, fed batch, continuous culture)
Metabolic flux balance analysis: fundamentals, methodologies, tools.
Strategies to improve the metabolic performance of the cells and the production process:
analysis of regulation of carbon source utilization (in yeasts)
strategies to utilize alternative carbon sources for biofuels production
strategies to redirect existent metabolic pathways to improve industrial processes
strategies to introduce new pathways for production of new compounds.

Unit of Biocatalysis and Biotransformations (C. Morelli)
Biotransformations and biocatalysis in industrial biotechnology. Use of microorganisms and isolated enzymes. Advantages and limitations of immobilized enzymes. Enzyme activity towards non natural substrates. IUBMB classification of enzymes.
Hydrolitic enzymes. Hydrolytic mechanism of proteases, esterases and lipases. Kinetic resolutions of racemases. Recycling of the non-processed substrate. Dynamic kinetic resolutions. Kinetic aspects and their relationships with optical activity of the resulting products. Selected applications to the production of drug intermediates. Production of natural and unnatural amino acids through hydrolase-catalyzed kinetic resolution. Biotechnological applications of lipases: soap production; lipases in detergents. Use of lipases in oleochemistry: production of modified lipids and structured lipids.
Amylases: production of high fructose and glucose syrups; flour standardization. Use of amylases in textile and paper industries. Amylase for detergents. Pectinolytic enzymes.
Dehydrogenases. Use of dehydrogenases for the production of chiral building blocks. Cofactor regeneration (NADH and NADPH). Substrate specificity and stereospecificity of commonly employed dehydrogenases. Amino acids production with amino acid dehydrogenases.
Biocatalytic formation of carbon-carbon bond. Aldolases classification. Substrate specificity and stereospecificity of aldolases and transketolases. Adolase- and transketolase-catalyzed preparation of rare and unnatural sugars and their analogues.