江南大学陈坚院士团队 | 食品生物合成：机遇与挑战

Core Insights - The article emphasizes the significant potential of food biosynthesis technology in addressing global food supply issues, meeting health and nutrition demands, and tackling environmental challenges [1][3]. Group 1: Opportunities in Food Biosynthesis - Food biosynthesis, based on synthetic biology and precision fermentation, can alleviate food supply pressures and provide a solid foundation for green and sustainable food production, driving deep transformation in the food industry [1]. - Countries worldwide are prioritizing the development of food biosynthesis, with Japan and the U.S. implementing strategic plans to promote food innovation, and China highlighting biomanufacturing in its national development strategies [3]. Group 2: Typical Applications of Food Biosynthesis - Key application areas include: 1. New protein sources 2. Oils 3. Starch 4. Food ingredients [4]. Group 3: Challenges in Food Biosynthesis - The design and efficient synthesis of new proteins are critical, requiring research in strain design, fermentation optimization, and food processing to create balanced and digestible alternative proteins [5]. - Establishing pathways for the biosynthesis of functional oils and developing efficient extraction and purification technologies are necessary for advancing new functional oil products [6]. - There is a need for innovative metabolic engineering or enzymatic synthesis pathways for new food functional ingredients to meet rising consumer demands for flavor and health attributes [7]. - Addressing the challenges in the biosynthesis of nutrients like vitamins and amino acids involves optimizing metabolic pathways and developing high-performance cell factories [8]. - Food biosynthesis also faces regulatory and safety challenges, necessitating the evolution of global regulatory frameworks to ensure safety while supporting industry growth [8]. Group 4: Summary and Outlook - The field of biomanufacturing, particularly through synthetic biology and precision fermentation, is entering a period of rapid development, providing essential technological support for addressing food manufacturing challenges [9]. - Significant progress has been made in the biosynthesis of new proteins, oils, starch, food ingredients, and nutrients, but challenges remain in various aspects of research and application [10]. - Future research directions include integrating AI with food biosynthesis technologies to create intelligent cell factories, expanding the range of synthetic products, and enhancing synthesis efficiency [10].