Biotechnological Production of Various Fungal Metabolites and their Applications in White Biotechnology

Abstract

The rapid growth of science and technology resulted in an increase in the production and utilization of chemical-based value-added compounds. Due to the involvement of greenhouse gases and global warming, there is a shift towards alternative strategies to replace chemical-based value-added products. Primary and secondary metabolites produced by various microorganisms could be an effective and environmentally friendly alternative to chemically manufactured value-added products. Metabolites produced from various fungal strains (filamentous fungi and yeast) are of high importance for their widespread applications in the food, agriculture, and pharmaceutical sectors. These value-added bioproducts include biofuel (bioethanol), organic acids (citric acid, lactic acid, succinic acid, and cis, cis-muconic acid), hydrolytic enzymes (cellulases, xylanase, phytase, lipase, ligninolytic enzymes, and proteases), vitamins, amino acids, antibiotics, drug molecules, and other industrialrelevant chemicals. Advances in industrial microbiology and biotechnology by metabolic engineering, protein engineering, systems biology, and synthetic biology led to the analysis and discovery of novel metabolic pathways and successive heterologous expression of metabolites of commercial importance. This chapter highlights the biotechnological production of a few relevant primary and secondary metabolites by both filamentous and unicellular fungi.