Inhibitory effects of galacturonic acid on Saccharomyces cerevisiae: involvement of hexose transporters. Saccharomyces cerevisiae

Aim: Analyse inhibitory effects of galacturonic acid, an important constituent of plant biomass hydrolysates, on growing and starving cultures of Saccharomyces cerevisiae CEN.PK113-7D. Method & Results: Biomass yields in aerobic and anaerobic glucose-limited chemostat cultures (pH 3.5) were reduced by 25 and 10%, respectively, upon addition of 10 g∙l-1 galacturonic acid. Genes previously reported to show a transcriptional response to other organic acids were overrepresented in a set of galacturonic-acid responsive genes identified by microarray analysis. These results suggested that galacturonic acid causes weak-acid uncoupling of the yeast plasma membrane pH gradient. Consistent with this hypothesis, galacturonate-accelerated loss of viability in starving cell suspensions was strongly pH dependent. Loss of viability was much slower in a strain in which all HXT (hexose transporter) genes were deleted. Moreover, deletion of HXT genes alleviated growth inhibition on ethanol observed at galacturonic acid concentrations of 10 g∙l-1 and above. Conclusions: At low pH, galacturonic acid negatively affects the physiology of S. cerevisiae. Reduced sensitivity of hexose-transporter mutants indicated that one or more HXT transporters are involved in transport of galacturonic acid. Significance and Impact: This study shows that galacturonic acid toxicity should be taken into account in process development for yeast-based fermentative conversion of pectin-rich feedstocks such as sugar beet pulp and citrus peel. Involvement of hexose transporters in galacturonic acid toxicity provides leads for improving tolerance. Overall design: To investigate the impact of galacturonic acid on S. cerevisiae, a DNA microarray-based transcriptome analysis was performed on aerobic, glucose-limited chemostat cultures grown in the presence and absence of 10 g∙l-1 galacturonic acid at pH3.5.