[Progress in biosynthesis of santalene and santalol]

Santalene and santalol are the main components of valuable perfume sandalwood essential oil, and have good antibacterial, anti-oxidation and anti-tumor activities. Commercial sandalwood essential oil is mainly extracted from sandalwood tree that grows slowly and is difficult to cultivate. In addition, the extraction recovery of sandalwood essential oil from sandalwood tree is too low to meet the market demand. These factors make sandalwood essential oil expensive. An option is to use genetic engineering and molecular biological methods to heterologously express related synthase of santalene and santalol in microbial host. In this paper, the biosynthesis progress of santalene and santalol synthase, as well as the optimization of mevalonate metabolic pathways in the hosts are summarized. Furthermore, the strategies of applying protein engineering technology to carry out orthomutation of santalene synthase were also discussed, to provide reference for the optimal biosynthesis of santalene and santalol.