Spatiotemporal Gene Expression by a Genetic Circuit for Chemical Production in Escherichia coli

Gene expression in spatiotemporal distribution improves the ability of cells to respond to changing environments. For microbial cell factories in artificial environments, reconstruction of the target compound's biosynthetic pathway in a new spatiotemporal dimension/scale promotes the production of chemicals. Here, a genetic circuit based on the Esa quorum sensing and lac operon was designed to achieve the dynamic temporal gene expression. Meanwhile, the pathway was regulated by an L- cysteine-specific sensor and relocalized to the plasma membrane for further flux enhancement to L-cysteine and toxicity reduction on a spatial scale. Finally, the integrated spatiotemporal regulation circuit for L-cysteine biosynthesis enabled a 14.16 g/L L-cysteine yield in Escherichia coli. Furthermore, this spatiotemporal regulation circuit was also applied in our previously constructed engineered strain for pantothenic acid, methionine, homoserine, and 2-aminobutyric acid production, and the titer increased by 29, 33, 28, and 41%, respectively. These results highlighted the applicability of our spatiotemporal regulation circuit to enhance the performance of microbial cell factories.

Automated summary

Gene expression in spatiotemporal distribution improves the ability of cells to respond to changing environments. A genetic circuit based on the Esa quorum sensing and lac operon was designed to achieve dynamic temporal gene expression. The circuit was also applied in microbial cell factories to enhance the production of various compounds, including L-cysteine, pantothenic acid, methionine, homoserine, and 2-aminobutyric acid, resulting in increased yields.