Increasing the natural biodiversity of microbial lipopeptides using a synthetic biology approach

Lipopeptides, biomolecules composed of a hydrophobic fatty acid chain and a hydrophilic peptide moiety, are one of the main promising classes of biosurfactants. Their mode of synthesis, by multienzymatic proteins consisting of repeated modules (nonribosomal peptide synthetases and sometimes polyketide synthases), is responsible for the high biodiversity observed in this family of amphiphilic compounds. This mode of synthesis generates many structural differences in the lipid and peptide moieties. These differences can be linked to multiple biological activities and physicochemical properties including surface-active ones with a wide range of applications in different sectors. One of the main drawbacks of lipopeptides is their production cost and yield. New synthetic biology approaches have been used to build up new lipopeptides, to improve lipopeptide production in the native host and to develop their heterologous production. After describing their mode of synthesis and the high biodiversity observed in surface-active lipopeptides, this chapter develops how this lipopeptide biodiversity can be increased to get new lipopeptides or improve the production of known lipopeptides through synthetic biology. The increasing understanding of the mode of biosynthesis of these lipopeptides and the use of synthetic biology should lead to the development of new cell factories increasing their yields and producing novel lipopeptide derivatives with increased surface-active properties.