A light-controlled cell lysis system in bacteria

作者：Wang, Geyi; Lu, Xin; Zhu, Yisha; Zhang, Wei; Liu, Jiahui; Wu, Yankang; Yu, Liyang; Sun, Dongchang^*; Cheng, Feng^*

来源：Journal of Industrial Microbiology and Biotechnology, 2018, 45(6): 429-432.

DOI：10.1007/s10295-018-2034-4

• Cell lysis
• Light-controlled system
• Fermentation industry
• Bacteria

Intracellular products (e.g., insulin), which are obtained through cell lysis, take up a big share of the biotech industry. It is often time-consuming, laborious, and environment-unfriendly to disrupt bacterial cells with traditional methods. In this study, we developed a molecular device for controlling cell lysis with light. We showed that intracellular expression of a single lysin protein was sufficient for efficient bacterial cell lysis. By placing the lysin-encoding gene under the control of an improved light-controlled system, we successfully controlled cell lysis by switching on/off light: OD600 of the Escherichia coli cell culture was decreased by twofold when the light-controlled system was activated under dark condition. We anticipate that our work would not only pave the way for cell lysis through a convenient biological way in fermentation industry, but also provide a paradigm for applying the light-controlled system in other fields of biotech industry.

• 出版日期2018-6
• 单位浙江工业大学