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Updated: Jun 26, 2025

A Toolkit to Enable Hydrocarbon Conversion in Aqueous Environments
Published on: October 2, 2012
Hydrogen production pathways in Clostridia and their improvement by metabolic engineering
Roberto Mazzoli1, Simone Pescarolo2, Giorgio Gilli3
1Structural and Functional Biochemistry, Laboratory of Proteomics and Metabolic Engineering of Prokaryotes, Department of Life Sciences and Systems Biology, University of Torino, Via Accademia Albertina 13, 10123 Torino, Italy.
Abstract:
Biological production of hydrogen has a tremendous potential as an environmentally sustainable technology to generate a clean fuel. Among the different available methods to produce biohydrogen, dark fermentation features the highest productivity and can be used as a means to dispose of organic waste biomass. Within this approach, Clostridia have the highest theoretical H2 production yield. Nonetheless, most strains show actual yields far lower than the theoretical maximum: improving their efficiency becomes necessary for achieving cost-effective fermentation processes. This review aims at providing a survey of the metabolic network involved in H2 generation in Clostridia and strategies used to improve it through metabolic engineering. Together with current achievements, a number of future perspectives to implement these results will be illustrated.
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