Control and Optimization of Metabolic Transitions – JANUS

Government policies recommend the development of sustainable microbial processes for the production of biobased compounds. Nevertheless, the use of complex mixtures of substrates issued from the deconstruction of biomass leads to long transition phases from one substrate to another, which is detrimental for biotechnological processes. These delays are notably linked to long transition phases when micro-organisms change their carbon source, such as in the transition from glucose to xylose (the two main substrates resulting from the deconstruction of lignocellulose). The partners of ANR JANUS have recently discovered that this transition phase favors the emergence of metabolically different subpopulations in the same monoclonal population, thus contradicting the commonly accepted model of homogeneous adaptation of the population. The ambition of ANR JANUS is to understand the role and regulation of these subpopulations, and thus to use this metabolic heterogeneity as a lever for improving biotransformation processes.