Chapter 9 - Metabolic engineering approaches for high-yield hydrocarbon biofuels

Abstract

Microbial short and long-chain hydrocarbons can be employed to produce high-quality vehicular fuels that can reduce greenhouse gas emission. Here, we describe the vital microorganisms and their metabolic pathways involved in the biosynthesis of hydrocarbon biofuels. This chapter's primary focus is to provide detailed information about how metabolic engineering can enhance the production of hydrocarbons based on the recently published literature. We also discussed the challenges and possible solutions in the current research efforts to scale-up the microbial production of hydrocarbon biofuels. Despite several hurdles, combined efforts toward designing high hydrocarbon-producing strains, finding cheaper feedstocks, and reducing the toxic stress of hydrocarbons to the strains will help to the build industrial-scale production plants of microbial hydrocarbons.