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The hydrolysis of lignocellulosic biomass liberates sugars, primarily glucose and xylose, which are subsequently converted to ethanol by microbial fermentation. The rapid and efficient fermentation of xylose by recombinant Saccharomyces cerevisiae strains is limited by weak acids generated during biomass pretreatment processes. In particular, acetic acid negatively affects cell growth, xylose fermentation rate, and ethanol production. The ability of S. cerevisiae to efficiently utilize xylose in the presence of acetic acid is an essential requirement for the cost-effective production of ethanol from lignocellulosic hydrolysates. Here, an acetic acid-responsive transcriptional activator, HAA1, was overexpressed in a recombinant xylose-fermenting S. cerevisiae strain to yield BY4741X/HAA1. This strain exhibited improved cell growth and ethanol production from xylose under aerobic and oxygen limited conditions, respectively, in the presence of acetic acid. The HAA1p regulon enhanced transcript levels in BY4741X/HAA1. The disruption of PHO13, a p-nitrophenylphosphatase gene, in BY4741X/HAA1 led to further improvement in both yeast growth and the ability to ferment xylose, indicating that HAA1 overexpression and PHO13 deletion act by different mechanisms to enhance ethanol production., (Copyright © 2014 The Society for Biotechnology, Japan. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

A recombinant xylose-utilizing Saccharomyces cerevisiae strain carrying one copy of heterologous XYL1 and XYL2 from Pichia stipitis and endogenous XKS1 under the control of the TDH3 promoter in the chromosomal DNA was constructed from the industrial haploid yeast strain NAM34-4C, which showed thermotolerance and acid tolerance. The recombinant S. cerevisiae strain SCB7 grew in minimal medium containing xylose as the sole carbon source, and its shortest generation time (G(short)) was 5 h. From this strain, four mutants showing rapid growth (G(short) = 2.5 h) in the minimal medium were isolated. The mutants carried four mutations that were classified into three linkage groups. Three mutations were dominant and one mutation was recessive to the wild type allele. The recessive mutation was in the PHO13 gene encoding para-nitrophenyl phosphatase. The other mutant genes were not linked to TAL1 gene encoding transaldolase. When the mutants and their parental strain were used for the batch fermentation in a complex medium at pH 4.0 containing 30 g/L xylose at 35 °C with shaking (60 rpm) and an initial cell density (Absorbance at 660 nm) of 1.0, all mutants showed efficient ethanol production and xylose consumption from the early stage of the fermentation culture. In two mutants, within 24 h, 4.8 g/L ethanol was produced, and the ethanol yield was 47%, which was 1.4 times higher than that achieved with the parental strain. The xylose concentration in the medium containing the mutant decreased linearly at a rate of 1 g/L/h until 24 h., (Copyright © 2013 The Society for Biotechnology, Japan. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)