Novel enzymes for fragrance and flavour

Ingredients from plants such as terpenes, used in the flavour and fragrance industry are increasingly produced by microbial production platforms. The objective of this proposal is to improve microbial production systems for plant terpenes. The production of terpenes is mediated by a single class of enzymes, the terpene synthases. These synthases are often limiting for production, and differ greatly in their efficiency. It has been shown that a more efficient synthase may strongly enhance the performance of a production microorganism. In this project, the generation of terpene synthases mutant libraries is explored, together with the study and assessment of applicable high throughput screening methods.