Skip to main content

Characterising biosynthesis for bioproduction: Systems biology and production processes

Guest Editors:

Qihe Chen: College of Biosystems Engineering and Food Science, China
XL Chen: Jiangnan University, China
Ying Shi: Zhejiang University, China


Submission Status: Closed


This special collection in Microbial Cell Factories  presents articles investigating biosynthetic pathways and methods in bacteria and fungi for bioproduction. Work describing new technical solutions of metabolites biosynthesis and applications in the food/feed, chemical, medical sectors are encouraged. Special consideration will be given to studies investigating the antimicrobial activity or bioactivity of bioproducts. Articles in this collection focus on two main areas:

1- Systems biology of cell factories

  • Separation, purification and characterization of metabolites synthesized by cell (bacteria/yeast) factories.
  • Novel bacterial production of metabolites and antimicrobial bioproducts. 

2- Microbial production processes

  • The biosynthesis pathway of materials including saccharides, acids, secondary metabolites or peptides, and the alternative biosynthesis approach instead of chemical synthesis.


This Collection supports and amplifies research related to SDG 7, SDG 11 and SDG 12.

Submission Guidelines

Back to top

This collection is no longer accepting submissions.

Articles will undergo the journal’s standard peer-review process and are subject to all of the journal’s standard policies. Articles will be added to the Collection as they are published.

The Guest Editors have no competing interests with the submissions which they handle through the peer review process. The peer review of any submissions for which the Guest Editors have competing interests is handled by another Editorial Board Member who has no competing interests.

  1. Peste des petits ruminants (PPR) is an acute, contact infectious disease caused by the small ruminant morbillivirus (SRMV), and its morbidity in goats and sheep can be up to 100% with significant mortality. Na...

    Authors: Miao Sun, Changjiang Wang, Huaye Luo, Yanfei Chen, Guanggang Qu, Jian Chen, Ling Li, Min Zhang and Qinghong Xue
    Citation: Microbial Cell Factories 2024 23:45
    Content type: Research Published on:

  2. The biosynthesis of human milk oligosaccharides (HMOs) using several microbial systems has garnered considerable interest for their value in pharmaceutics and food industries. 2′-Fucosyllactose (2′-FL), the mo...

    Authors: Ran You, Lei Wang, Meirong Hu and Yong Tao
    Citation: Microbial Cell Factories 2024 23:38
    Content type: Research Published on:

  3. Overproduction of desired native or nonnative biochemical(s) in (micro)organisms can be achieved through metabolic engineering. Appropriate rewiring of cell metabolism is performed by making rational changes s...

    Authors: Leila Hassani, Mohammad R. Moosavi, Payam Setoodeh and Habil Zare
    Citation: Microbial Cell Factories 2024 23:37
    Content type: Methodology Published on:

  4. Melanin is a natural pigment that is considered a promising biomaterial for numerous biotechnological applications across several industries. Melanin has biomedical applications as antimicrobial, anticancer, a...

    Authors: Nessma A. El-Zawawy, El-Refaie Kenawy, Sara Ahmed and Shimaa El-Sapagh
    Citation: Microbial Cell Factories 2024 23:23
    Content type: Research Published on:

  5. Antibiotics biosynthesis is usually regulated by the cluster-situated regulatory gene(s) (CSRG(s)), which directly regulate the genes within the corresponding biosynthetic gene cluster (BGC). Previously, we ha...

    Authors: Yue Mao, Xianyan Zhang, Tianyu Zhou, Bingbing Hou, Jiang Ye, Haizhen Wu, Ruida Wang and Huizhan Zhang
    Citation: Microbial Cell Factories 2024 23:3
    Content type: Research Published on:

  6. It is increasingly recognized that conventional food production systems are not able to meet the globally increasing protein needs, resulting in overexploitation and depletion of resources, and environmental d...

    Authors: Myrsini Sakarika, Frederiek-Maarten Kerckhof, Lotte Van Peteghem, Alexandra Pereira, Tim Van Den Bossche, Robbin Bouwmeester, Ralf Gabriels, Delphi Van Haver, Barbara Ulčar, Lennart Martens, Francis Impens, Nico Boon, Ramon Ganigué and Korneel Rabaey
    Citation: Microbial Cell Factories 2023 22:254
    Content type: Research Published on:

  7. Photosynthetic cyanobacterial components are gaining great economic importance as prospective low-cost biostimulants for the green synthesis of metal nanoparticles with valuable medical and industrial applicat...

    Authors: Asmaa H. Al-Badwy, Ahmed M. Khalil, Ali H. Bashal and Rashad Kebeish
    Citation: Microbial Cell Factories 2023 22:247
    Content type: Research Published on:

  8. In whole-cell bio-catalysis, the biosystems engineering paradigm shifts from the global reconfiguration of cellular metabolism as in fermentation to a more focused, and more easily modularized, optimization of...

    Authors: Sabine Schelch, Manuel Eibinger, Jasmin Zuson, Jürgen Kuballa and Bernd Nidetzky
    Citation: Microbial Cell Factories 2023 22:241
    Content type: Research Published on:

  9. Thermophilic fungus Myceliophthora thermophila has been widely used in industrial applications due to its ability to produce various enzymes. However, the lack of an efficient protein expression system has limite...

    Authors: Jinyang Li, Yidi Wang, Kun Yang, Xiaolu Wang, Yuan Wang, Honglian Zhang, Huoqing Huang, Xiaoyun Su, Bin Yao, Huiying Luo and Xing Qin
    Citation: Microbial Cell Factories 2023 22:236
    Content type: Research Published on:

  11. Cyanobacteria are a potential source of promising secondary metabolites with different biological activities, including antibacterial, antiviral, antifungal, antiprotozoal, and anticancer activities. To combat...

    Authors: Mabroka H. Saad, Nagwa M. Sidkey and Esmail M. El-Fakharany
    Citation: Microbial Cell Factories 2023 22:229
    Content type: Research Published on:

  12. Mycosynthesis of silver nanoparticles (SNPs) offers a safe, eco-friendly, and promising alternative technique for large-scale manufacturing. Our study might be the first report that uses mycelial filtrate of a...

    Authors: Nessma A. EL-Zawawy, Alaa M. Abou-Zeid, Doha M. Beltagy, Nada H. Hantera and Hoda S. Nouh
    Citation: Microbial Cell Factories 2023 22:228
    Content type: Research Published on:

  13. Providing sufficient and usable energy for the cell factory has long been a heated issue in biosynthesis as solar energy has never been rooted out from the strategy for improvement, and turning Escherichia coli (...

    Authors: Chao-Yu Lee, Kai-Wen Chen, Chih-Lu Chiang, Hsuan-Yu Kao, Hao-Cheng Yu, Hsiao-Ching Lee and Wen-Liang Chen
    Citation: Microbial Cell Factories 2023 22:207
    Content type: Research Published on:

  14. In this study, the effect of static magnetic fields (SMFs) on improving the performance of activated sludge process to enhance the higher rate of microbial growth biomass and improve sludge settling characteri...

    Authors: Ghorban Asgari, Abdolmotaleb Seid-Mohammadi, Reza Shokoohi, Mohammad Reza Samarghandi, Glen T. Daigger, Behrooz Malekolkalami and Ramin Khoshniyat
    Citation: Microbial Cell Factories 2023 22:195
    Content type: Research Published on:

  15. Microbial fuel cell (MFC) is a bio-electrical energy generator that uses respiring microbes to transform organic matter present in sludge into electrical energy. The primary goal of this work was to introduce ...

    Authors: Amal S. Othman, Nashwa A. Ahmed, Mona S. Elneklawi, Mansour M. Hassan and Mahmoud Abd El-Mongy
    Citation: Microbial Cell Factories 2023 22:183
    Content type: Research Published on:

  16. Alginate oligosaccharides (AOs) are the degradation products of alginate, a natural polysaccharide abundant in brown algae. AOs generated by enzymatic hydrolysis have diverse bioactivities and show broad appli...

    Authors: Xiao-Hui Sun, Xiu-Lan Chen, Xiao-Fei Wang, Xin-Ru Zhang, Xiao-Meng Sun, Mei-Ling Sun, Xi-Ying Zhang, Yu-Zhong Zhang, Yu-Qiang Zhang and Fei Xu
    Citation: Microbial Cell Factories 2023 22:179
    Content type: Research Published on:

  17. γ-aminobutyric acid (GABA) is a bioactive compound produced by lactic acid bacteria (LAB). The diversity of GABA production in the Lactococcus genus is poorly understood. Genotypic and phenotypic approaches were ...

    Authors: Valérie Laroute, Nathalie Aubry, Marjorie Audonnet, Muriel Mercier-Bonin, Marie-Line Daveran-Mingot and Muriel Cocaign-Bousquet
    Citation: Microbial Cell Factories 2023 22:178
    Content type: Research Published on:

  18. Pyocyanin is a secondary metabolite secreted by P. aeruginosa. It is a redox-active blue/green phenazine pigment that has various beneficial applications. The present study aims at screening the production of pyo...

    Authors: Heba Shouman, Heba Shehta Said, Hany I. Kenawy and Ramadan Hassan
    Citation: Microbial Cell Factories 2023 22:166
    Content type: Research Published on:

  19. Compared with steviol glycosides, the taste of glucosylated steviol glycosides is better and more similar to that of sucrose. At present, cyclodextrin glucanotransferase (CGTase) is primarily used to catalyze ...

    Authors: Ruiqin Zhang, Ruiqi Tang, Wei Wang, Jiahua Bi, Xianrui Xu, Qiuling Fan, Yanjun Li and Qihe Chen
    Citation: Microbial Cell Factories 2023 22:113
    Content type: Research Published on: