Multi-omics insights into the mechanism of the high-temperature tolerance in a thermotolerant Chlorella sorokiniana

Kejing Song; Zhenzhen Zhou; Yaxin Huang; Lin Chen; Wei Cong

doi:10.1016/j.biortech.2023.129859

Multi-omics insights into the mechanism of the high-temperature tolerance in a thermotolerant Chlorella sorokiniana

Bioresour Technol. 2023 Dec:390:129859. doi: 10.1016/j.biortech.2023.129859. Epub 2023 Oct 12.

Authors

Kejing Song¹, Zhenzhen Zhou², Yaxin Huang¹, Lin Chen³, Wei Cong⁴

Affiliations

¹ State Key Laboratory of Biochemical Engineering, Institute of Process Engineering, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China; School of Chemical Engineering, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China.
² State Key Laboratory of Biochemical Engineering, Institute of Process Engineering, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China.
³ Key Laboratory of Biofuels, Key Laboratory of Shandong Energy Biological Genetic Resources, Qingdao Institute of Bioenergy and Bioprocess Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Qingdao 266071, China.
⁴ State Key Laboratory of Biochemical Engineering, Institute of Process Engineering, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China. Electronic address: weicong@ipe.ac.cn.

PMID: 37832851
DOI: 10.1016/j.biortech.2023.129859

Abstract

Improving high-temperature tolerance of microalgae is crucial to enhance the robustness and economy of microalgae industrial production. Herein, a continuous adaptive laboratory evolution (ALE) system was developed to generate the thermotolerant strain of Chlorella sorokiniana. The resulting thermotolerant strain TR42 exhibited excellent cell growth and biomass production at 42 °C, the temperature that the original strain (OS) could not survive. The high-temperature resistant mechanism of TR42 was investigated by integrating the physiology, transcriptome, proteome and metabolome analyses, which involved enhancing antioxidant capacity, maintaining protein homeostasis, remodeling photosynthetic metabolism, and regulating the synthesis of heat-stress related metabolites. The proof-of-concept high-temperature outdoor cultivation demonstrated that TR42 exhibited 1.15- to 5.72-fold increases in biomass production and 1.62- to 7.04-fold increases in lipid productivity compared to those of OS, respectively, which provided a promising platform for microalgae industrial production. Thus, the multi-system thermotolerant mechanism of TR42 offered potential targets for enhancing high-temperature tolerance of microalgae.

Keywords: Adaptive laboratory evolution; Chlorella sorokiniana; High-temperature tolerance; Multi-omics analyses; Outdoor cultivation.

MeSH terms

Biomass
Chlorella* / metabolism
Microalgae* / metabolism
Multiomics
Temperature