Carotenoid ketolases
AssigneeE. I. Du Pont de Nemours and Company
InventorsQiong Cheng, Luan Tao, Henry Yao
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Abstract
Novel CrtW carotenoid ketolase are provided that are useful for the production of ketocarotenoids. The ketolases genes of the present invention exhibit low homology in comparison to other CrtW ketolases previously reported. Expression of the carotenoid ketolases in heterologous hosts enabled production of canthaxanthin and astaxanthin. Coexpression experiments using divergent crtW genes resulted in increased production of the desired ketocarotenoids.
Claims10
An isolated nucleic acid molecule encoding a carotenoid ketolase enzyme, selected from the group consisting of:
- (a) an isolated nucleic acid molecule encoding an amino acid as set forth in SEQ ID NO:4;
- (b) an isolated nucleic acid molecule that hybridizes with (a) under the following wash conditions:
- 0.1×SSC, 0.1% SDS, 65° C.;
- or
- an isolated nucleic acid molecule that is fully complementary to (a), or (b).
An isolated nucleic acid molecule encoding a carotenoid ketolase enzyme, the enzyme of 259 amino acid that has at least 95% identity based on the Smith-Waterman method of alignment when compared to a polypeptide having the sequence as set forth in SEQ ID NO:4;
- or a second nucleotide sequence comprising the complement of the first nucleotide sequence.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.