Model microorganisms: From cornerstones of modern discovery to big data-driven platforms

Résumé fourni par la source

For more than a century, model microorganisms have underpinned major biological explorations and facilitated pivotal advances in molecular genetics, biochemistry and biotechnology. These easy-to-manipulate microbes continue to drive technological progress in life sciences, ranging from the decoding of genetic code using Escherichia coli to the application of CRISPR-Cas9 genome editing in various microbial hosts. This article systematically reviews the latest research progress of model microorganisms, and highlights their transformation from basic research objects into programmable chassis for synthetic biology and industrial bioproduction. Benefiting from large-scale microbial big data resources, intelligent data mining technologies and iterative synthetic biology advances, researchers are now tapping into previously unexplored microbial biodiversity to enable customized strain design—developing novel chassis strains tailored for specific applications ranging from chronic disease intervention to targeted biomanufacturing. Combined with CRISPR editing, synthetic genome assembly and AI-assisted optimization, microbial models have evolved into programmable and personalized engineering platforms. Specialized chassis represented by Pseudomonas putida for environmental remediation and Streptomyces for antibiotic discovery further diversify the functional scenarios of modern microbial biotechnology. This review systematically summarizes recent advances in model microorganism research, focusing on the evolving functional positioning of microbial chassis from basic research tools to industrial engineering platforms. It also elaborates on prevailing bottlenecks including industrial scale-up difficulties, imperfect regulatory systems and biosafety risks. Such advanced engineering platforms offer promising solutions to key challenges in human health protection, sustainable agriculture and green biomanufacturing, fueling the sustainable innovation of modern life sciences and biotechnology.

Ce résumé expose les affirmations des auteurs. BNTIC ne l’interprète pas comme une validation indépendante des résultats.