Development of genetic markers in Yarrowia lipolytica

The oleaginous yeast Yarrowia lipolytica represents a potential microbial cell factory for the recombinant production of various valuable products. Currently, the commonly used selection markers for transformation in Y. lipolytica are limited, and successive genetic manipulations are often restricted by the number of available selection markers. In our study, we developed a dominant marker, dsdA, which encodes a D-serine deaminase for genetic manipulation in Y. lipolytica. In Y. lipolytica, this marker confers the ability to use D-serine as a nitrogen source. In addition, the selection conditions of several infrequently used dominant markers including bleoR (zeocin resistance), kanMX (G418 resistance), and guaB (mycophenolic acid resistance) were also analyzed. Our results demonstrated that these selection markers can be used for the genetic manipulation of Y. lipolytica and their selection conditions were different for various strains. Ultimately, the selection markers tested here will be useful to expand the genetic toolbox of Y. lipolytica. KEY POINTS: • The dsdA from Escherichia coli was developed as a dominant marker. • The applicability of several resistance markers in Y. lipolytica was determined. • We introduced the Cre/mutant lox system for marker recycling.