Medium engineering for enhanced production of undecylprodigiosin antibiotic in Streptomyces coelicolor using oil palm biomass hydrolysate as a carbon source

• Oil palm biomass hydrolysate has furfural and hydroxymethylfurfural as inhibitors.
• Furfural effects xylose utilization in S. coelicolor adversely.
• Mycelia formation is decreased with reduction in actinorhodin production.
• Furfural elicits undecylprodigiosin production in S. coelicolor up to 52%.
• Engineered EFB hydrolysate media resulted a 88% higher undecylprodigiosin production.

In this study, a biosugar obtained from empty fruit bunch (EFB) of oil palm by hot water treatment and subsequent enzymatic saccharification was used for undecylprodigiosin production, using Streptomyces coelicolor. Furfural is a major inhibitor present in EFB hydrolysate (EFBH), having a minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) of 1.9 mM, and it reduces utilization of glucose (27%), xylose (59%), inhibits mycelium formation, and affects antibiotic production. Interestingly, furfural was found to be a good activator of undecylprodigiosin production in S. coelicolor, which enhanced undecylprodigiosin production by up to 52%. Optimization by mixture analysis resulted in a synthetic medium containing glucose:furfural:ACN:DMSO (1%, 2 mM, 0.2% and 0.3%, respectively). Finally, S. coelicolor was cultured in a fermenter in minimal medium with EFBH as a carbon source and addition of the components described above. This yielded 4.2 μg/mg dcw undecylprodigiosin, which was 3.2-fold higher compared to that in un-optimized medium.

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