Metabolic evolution of two reducing equivalent-conserving pathways for high-yield succinate production in Escherichia coli

Reducing equivalents are an important cofactor for efficient synthesis of target products. During metabolic evolution to improve succinate production in Escherichia coli strains, two reducing equivalent-conserving pathways were activated to increase succinate yield. The sensitivity of pyruvate dehydrogenase to NADH inhibition was eliminated by three nucleotide mutations in the lpdA gene. Pyruvate dehydrogenase activity increased under anaerobic conditions, which provided additional NADH. The pentose phosphate pathway and transhydrogenase were activated by increased activities of transketolase and soluble transhydrogenase SthA. These data suggest that more carbon flux went through the pentose phosphate pathway, thus leading to production of more reducing equivalent in the form of NADPH, which was then converted to NADH through soluble transhydrogenase for succinate production. Reverse metabolic engineering was further performed in a parent strain, which was not metabolically evolved, to verify the effects of activating these two reducing equivalent-conserving pathways for improving succinate yield. Activating pyruvate dehydrogenase increased succinate yield from 1.12 to 1.31 mol/mol, whereas activating the pentose phosphate pathway and transhydrogenase increased succinate yield from 1.12 to 1.33 mol/mol. Activating these two pathways in combination led to a succinate yield of 1.5 mol/mol (88% of theoretical maximum), suggesting that they exhibited a synergistic effect for improving succinate yield.