Recent advances in engineering microbial lipases for industrial applications

Lipases, a green biocatalyst found in animals, plants, and microorganisms, are widely used in the agricultural, biofuel, cosmetics, chemical, food, pharmaceutical, and textile industries due to their versatility, exceptional specificity, and ease of production and use. However, the presence of multiple isoforms of microbial lipases often limits their applications and requires costly purification. There are also growing demands for improved lipase stability, activity, and specificity in industrial applications. One emerging research direction in this field is integrating synthetic biology and engineering tools to design novel lipases for diverse industrial applications. Recent progress in protein engineering, immobilization technologies, and artificial intelligence (AI) tools have significantly improved lipase catalytic performance. This paper provides a comprehensive review of the classification, general characteristics, industrial production and applications of lipases and recent advances in engineering lipases and lipase-producing microbial cells to develop novel lipase-based bioprocesses and bioproducts.