To facilitate lipid-lowering effects, a lovastatin-producing microbial co-culture system (LPMCS) was constituted with a novel strain Monascus purpureus R5 in combination with Lacticaseibacillus casei S5 and Saccharomyces cerevisiae J7, which increased lovastatin production by 54.21% compared with the single strain R5. Response Surface Methodology (RSM) optimization indicated lovastatin yield peaked at 7.43 mg/g with a fermentation time of 13.88 d, water content of 50.5%, and inoculum ratio of 10.27%. Meanwhile, lovastatin in LPMCS co-fermentation extracts (LFE) was qualitatively and quantitatively analyzed by Thin-Layer Chromatography (TLC) and High-Performance Liquid Chromatography (HPLC). Cellular experiments demonstrated that LFE exhibited no obvious cytotoxicity to L-02 cells and exhibited excellent biosafety. Most notably, high-dose LFE (100 mg/L) exhibited the highest reduction of lipid accumulation, total cholesterol, and triglycerides simultaneously in oleic acid-induced L-02 cells, which decreased by 71.59%, 38.64%, and 58.85% than untreated cells, respectively. Overall, LPMCS provides a potential approach to upgrade the lipid-lowering activity of Monascus-fermented products with higher health-beneficial effects.
Keywords: Cellular lipid-lowering; Hyperlipidemia; Microbial co-culture system; Monascus purpureus R5; Probiotics.
© 2023. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature.