Enhancing terpenoid production in Saccharomyces cerevisiae via cell morphology engineering

There is a growing interest in establishing yeast as a cell factory for terpenoid production. Given the hydrophobicity of many terpenoids, expanding the intracellular storage pool is an effective strategy to improve titers. In this study, the storage capacity was enhanced by increasing yeast cell size through the knockout of EST1 and SSN8. The influence on lycopene and 7-dehydrocholesterol production were then evaluated. The results demonstrated that EST1 and SSN8 deletion resulted in 4.27- and 3.45-fold improvement on lycopene production, and 1.99- and 1.2-fold improvement on 7-dehydrocholesterol production, respectively. These findings suggest cell enlargement as a promising strategy for enhancing terpenoid production in yeast.