Abstract

Polyhydroxyalkanoates (PHAs) are biodegradable polyesters produced by some bacteria as a carbon and energy storage material from renewable resources. have attracted great interest as environmentally friendly replacements of petroleum-based plastics and have potential applications as bulk-commodity plastics and biomaterials for biomedical use. The PHA polymers with the broadest diversity for material properties incorporate 3-hydroxyalkanoate repeating units into their structure. The physical properties of these PHA polymers are dictated by their repeating unit composition and can be divided into three main classes: short-chain-length (SCL) PHA polymers are made up of repeating units of 3-5 carbons and exhibit thermoplastic properties, medium-chain-length (MCL) PHA polymers are made up of repeating units of 6-14 carbons and exhibit elastomeric properties and SCL-MCL PHA copolymers that exhibit a range of physical properties dependent on the mol ratio of SCL to MCL repeating units in the polymer. Our lab is interested in engineering metabolic pathways and enzymes in bacteria in order to generate PHA polymers with strictly controlled material properties. In this presentation, I will discuss some of the new pathways and methods we have developed to produce PHAs in bacteria.