Kinetic modeling and sensitivity analysis of acetone–butanol–ethanol production

A kinetic simulation model of metabolic pathways that describes the dynamic behaviors of metabolites in acetone–butanol–ethanol (ABE) production by Clostridium saccharoperbutylacetonicum N1-4 was proposed using a novel simulator WinBEST-KIT. This model was validated by comparing with experimental time-course data of metabolites in batch cultures over a wide range of initial glucose concentrations (36.1–295 mM). By introducing substrate inhibition, product inhibition of butanol, activation of butyrate and considering the cessation of metabolic reactions in the case of insufficiency of energy after glucose exhaustion, the revised model showed 0.901 of squared correlation coefficient (r2) between experimental time-course of metabolites and calculated ones. Thus, the final revised model is assumed to be one of the best candidates for kinetic simulation describing dynamic behavior of metabolites in ABE production. Sensitivity analysis revealed that 5% increase in reaction of reverse pathway of butyrate production (R17) and 5% decrease in reaction of CoA transferase for butyrate (R15) highly contribute to high production of butanol. These system analyses should be effective in the elucidation which pathway is metabolic bottleneck for high production of butanol.