Planta Med 2011; 77 - PB36
DOI: 10.1055/s-0031-1282290

Biotransformation of trans-farnesol by Ceriporiopsis subvermispora

S Lee 1, S Kim 1, I Choi 1
  • 1Department of Forest Sciences, College of Agriculture & Life Sciences, Seoul National University, Seoul, South Korea.

Terpenoids which are included in various plants are important for the food, animal feed, cosmetics and pharmaceuticals industries greatly. However they are expensive due to low concentration and difficult isolation. Therefore biotransformation of terpenoids could be an alternative way to produce them.

In this study, whole cell of Ceriporiopsis subvermispora was used in biotransformation as biocatalyst. C. subvermispora is a naturally occurring fungus able to remove phenolic compounds than other compounds. Farnesol is a sesquiterpene which is an acyclic sesquiterpene alcohol derivative of farnesol Pyrophosphate and the building block of most acyclic sesquiterpenoids and is an important starting compound for organic synthesis. Therefore it has been chosen as starting material for biotransformation. The object of this study was to investigate the microbial biotransformation of trans-farnesol by C. subvermispora at different culture condition in order to obtain the more valuable sesqui-terpenoid stuructures.

Biotransformation was started after inoculation by added 0.005g M-1 of homogenized strains into the 100ml SSC medium culture flasks. After 48 hours, substrate 200ul was added in the 250ml flask with 0.1% Tween 80. Per 24h, one flask were stopped for cultivation and extracted with solvents at 250 rpm, 3 times using the shaker.

The final solutions were subjected to gas chromatography FID spectrometry (GC-FID) and GC-MS. After 10 days, when used the C. subvermispora as the biocatalyst, novel compounds produced in SSC medium. These products were nerolidol, farnesol, β-farnesol, bisabolene, eudesm-7(11)-en-4α-ol.

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