Lower Citrinin Production by Gene Disruption of ctnB Involved in Citrinin Biosynthesis in Monascus aurantiacus Li AS3.4384

The filamentous fungi Monascus spp. have been used in the production of food colorants and health remedies for more than 1000 years in Asia. However, greater attention has been given to the safety of Monascus products because they contain citrinin, which is harmful to the hepatic and renal systems. The citrinin biosynthetic gene cluster has been characterized in Monasucs aurantiacus. The ctnB gene encoding an oxidoreductase is located between pksCT and ctnA. In this study, a ctnB replacement vector (pCTNB-HPH) was constructed to disrupt the ctnB gene with a hygromycin resistance gene as the selection marker. The linear vector was transformed into M. aurantiacus using the protoplast CaCl2/polyethylene glycol (PEG) method. Three ctnB-disrupted strains were obtained by homologous recombination. In comparison to the parental strain, the Delta ctnB mutants barely produced citrinin. These data confirmed that the ctnB gene is directly involved in citrinin biosynthesis. Moreover, the yields of the pigments of two disruptants were similar to that of the wild-type strain, but the yield of another mutant was slightly higher than that of the latter strain. These results indicate that the production of the mycotoxin citrinin was successfully eliminated through genetic engineering.