The biotechnological application of microbes in history dates back as early as 5000 BC in Mesopotamia, where cereals were fermented to produce alcoholic drinks. Back then, there was no knowledge of the existence of microbes, let alone their industrial applications and impact on different aspects of modern civilization. However, the history of microbiology has been incremental, where generations built upon the work of their predecessors. For instance, without the application of yeast to make beer and bread by the Egyptians, who then spread it to the rest of the Old World, Louis Pasteur would have never explained the scientific causes of fermentation (Vitorino & Bessa, 2017). However, microbes never got to work until they started to be applied on an industrial scale. For instance, the demand for glycerol for use in the manufacturing of explosives in World War I facilitated the application of microbial activity at industrial (Semkiv et al., 2017). Additionally, following the discovery of the medical applications of penicillin and its large-scale industrial production by Fleming intensified the interest and research on an international scale. As a result, the different fields of applied microbiology, especially in the food industry, health care, and fuel production, are a fascination of mine. This paper is a short discussion of how we employ different microbes to our advantage, with a special focus on the three fields previously mentioned.
Microbes in the Food Industry
In today’s food industry, microbes play two different roles. First, they are production facilities for different food ingredients (Vitorino & Bessa, 2017). Therefore, the microbes might be modified genetically to enhance their productivity. However, this application of the microbes is indirect because the microorganism would never participate directly in industrial processes like the fermentation of food. Despite this, the microorganisms have found themselves grown and modified for the production of enzymes, dyes, and fermentation agents, among others. The second industrial application of microorganisms is their value as fermentation starters. In this case, genetic modification is not allowed. Regardless, the genetic modification of microorganisms, especially yeasts, have increased their productivity. For instance, modified yeasts have a higher tolerance for environmental conditions, especially pH, temperature, and different substrates (Singh et al., 2017). According to Lipkie et al. (2016), these modified microbes have additional nutritional values. For instance, the UV radiation of years allows for the production of foods with elevated vitamin D levels after they adapt to environmental conditions.
Delegate your assignment to our experts and they will do the rest.
On the other hand, yeasts have also been used for the industrial production of alcoholic beverages, especially wines. For instance, the sensory qualities of different wines can be improved by the application of beta-lyase producing yeast (Belda et al., 2016). On the other hand, if flocculation is the desired quality, such as sparkling wine, different yeasts can be used. Besides, according to Vitorino & Bessa (2017), non-Saccharomyces strains were previously ignored because they produced unwanted qualities. However, these strains are now important to the vinification process as they are used to produce more complex wines. Finally, probiotic microorganisms, such as Lactobacillus, have numerous benefits that they are increasingly being used in the industrial production of different food. For instance, non-dairy beverages are quickly becoming popular for niche consumers like vegans.
As previously mentioned, the other valuable industrial application of microbial activity is in the production or use of enzymes. For instance, Aspergillus Niger and Bacillus subtilis help in the production of amylases. As a healthier alternative, these amylases are increasingly being used to treat wheat flour (Bueno et al., 2016). Besides the health benefits, they also allow the industrial-scale production of pre-cooked foods. On the other hand, there is a growing market for aromatized dairy products. These products are obtained from the application of Rhizomucor meihei strains. According to Vitorino & Bessa (2017), these strains are useful because they allow for the enzyme to recover through the production of different extracellular lipase. On the other hand, humans and animals have difficulties processing cellulase and pectinase. However, filamentous fungi like Cladosporium sphaerospermum are good at digesting and degrading these molecules. Therefore, they have found application in reducing the viscosity of juices (Andersen et al., 2016). From such cases, it is clear that microbes and microbial activity are directly responsible for the diversity of food products in the food industry.
That, however, is not the end of their potential as essential ingredients in the food industry. According to Vitorino & Bessa (2017), enzymes derived from the microbial activity are also used to add flavors and scents to different food items. For instance, yeasts of the genus Pichia produce the natural flavor known as isoamyl acetate (Vitorino & Bessa, 2017). When used to ferment coffee, they improve the flavor. Besides, these microbes have two advantages that are not replicable. First, they are easy to grow and sustain. Additionally, their growth rate is very fast. Secondly, different pathways can be developed to convert cheap precursors, like glucose, into costly products. For instance, acetoin can be derived from glucose using E. coli (Vitorino & Bessa, 2017). The different synthetic pathways are of special interest to me because one can evolve different products from the same inexpensive substrates and different microorganisms.
Microbes in Health Care
Microorganisms are valued in the health care industry for four reasons. First, they enable natural and biological control of diseases and pests. Secondly, microbes have been used to develop different vaccines. Thirdly, microbes are valuable in the production of antibiotics. Lastly, they have the potential for application in biotherapeutics, such as the production of biomaterials and hormones.
For instance, in developing and underdeveloped countries, Malaria, dengue, and yellow fever outbreaks are common and lead to unnecessary deaths. These outbreaks can, however, bee controlled by controlling the vectors. According to Vitorino & Bessa (2017), the mosquito Aedes aegypti has been discovered to be controlled by Wolbachia. Aedes aegypti is responsible for several outbreaks of dengue and yellow fever and even the Zika virus. The bacterium Wolbachia, however, shortens the mosquito’s lifespan. This implies that the mosquitos, especially females, die before they mature and reproduce (Vitorino & Bessa, 2017). Additionally, the bacterium can be transmitted from an adult to offspring. If mosquito populations are controlled biologically, then their chances of causing outbreaks are reduced. Besides, the impact is exponential. First, there are fewer mosquitos to spread infections. Secondly, their reproductive abilities are impacted when they die young. Thirdly, infected females are more likely to pass the bacterium on to the offspring. As a result, the bacterium persists with time, making it a highly cost-effective biological control for the vectors.
Bacterium Wolbachia is not the only natural control against vectors that cause outbreaks, however. Biological insecticides are also an alternative. For instance, the bacterium B. thuringiensis serotype israelensis produces two types of inactive endotoxins, Cry and Cty, that can be used to control mosquitos. When the larvae of the Aedes mosquito ingest the toxins, their intestinal proteases activate them. As a result, the interaction between the now active toxins and larvae cells inhibits proper growth and development, and finally, death (Vitorino & Bessa, 2017). These biological insecticides have been very successful commercially and have been produced and sold to different markets in the world. However, some mosquito strains have developed a natural resistance for the toxins, reducing the effectiveness of the insecticide (Mihiddin et al., 2016). Additionally, unlike the bacterium Wolbachia, the biological insecticides are not persistent over time because they only kill the larvae.
In the US, antibiotic-resistant bacteria, also known as superbugs, affect more than 2 million people every year. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, MRSA (methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus) and clostridium difficile are among the most cause of hospital-acquired infections in the country, accounting for 10,000 and over 80,000 cases every year (Vitorino & Bessa, 2017). The incorporation of teixobactin, however, helps to develop a new class of antibiotic that kills all bacteria, including MRSA. According to Borghesi & Stronati (2015), teixobactin is effective because it targets the lipids that maintain the bacterial cell walls. Though it is believed that no bacteria could develop immunity for teixobactin, it still remains the fact that the discovery process for newer and more effective antibiotics, especially against superbugs, is slow. This process is being accelerated by the discovery of Selenium nanoparticles and their synergistic antibacterial effect on MRSA and other superbugs when combined with quercetin and acetylcholine (Huang et al., 2016). Research and development are still ongoing, but it is clear that microbes could potentially do more in health care in the future, provided the research continues.
Microbes as Alternative Fuel and Renewable Energy Sources
The 21 st century is marked by a few existential threats to human life, among them, climate change and global warming followed the unsustainable consumption patterns of non-renewable energy sources and other scarce natural resources. However, microbes have the potential to produce several organic acids from renewable carbon sources. According to Vitorino & Bessa (2017), the idea is possible because organic acids are either products or intermediates of several metabolic pathways. For instance, citric acid naturally occurs in quantities that do not satisfy its global demand as a food additive. However, the fermentation of glucose, such as from corn starch or molasses using the bacterium A. niger, enabled its production at industrial scales (Wang et al., 2016). Similarly, lactic acid is another organic acid whose application in the food, textile, pharmaceutical, and leather industries raises its demands. As a result, several metabolic pathways have been discovered to produce it at industrial scales. Lactic acid can, therefore, be produced by the fermentation of Saccharomyces cerevisiae in a glucose-rich medium (Vitorino & Bessa, 2017). The list is not exhaustive, but the two examples show the potential of converting renewable carbon sources into organic acids for industrial purposes. This changes the carbon cycle and allows a significant amount of carbon to cycle through the ecosystem without allowing its accumulation in dangerous sinks, like the atmosphere.
Likewise, microbial metabolic pathways have increasingly been used to target global energy demands, especially reducing the dependence on fossil fuel and other non-renewable materials as a source of energy. This has the potential for countries to attain their sustainable development goals in light of the environmental crises caused by human activity since the dawn of the industrial era. For instance, acetone and butanol can be produced by microbes of the genus Clostridium at industrial scales ( Matuszewska, 2016). Genus clostridium is also essential for the microbial production of 1,3-propanediol that is an important biodegradable polymer (Vitorino & Bessa, 2017).
Putting Microbes to Work in other Industries
Industrial management of waste, especially organic industrial effluents, is an important application of microbial activity. For instance, waste water containing triglycerides is treated by the addition of lipases. These enzymes, according to Vitorino & Bessa (2017), work by aerobic degradation. Using such enzymes to treat waste was is not only beneficial but also cheaper. The enzymes, however, are biodegradable and sensitive to temperature and pH changes, making their efficient application impossible for people, industries, and government without the knowledge. In agriculture, on the other hand, microbial activity is a tried and tested biological control for pests and weeds. Natural proteins like Cry and Cyt are effective pesticides applied to control caterpillars in tomato and corn plantations (Vitorino & Bessa, 2017).
Conclusion
In conclusion, microbes have the potential to solve most of the challenges facing modern civilization. For instance, populations are growing faster than the amount of food produced to feed them. However, by putting microbes to work in the food industry, it is possible to solve most problems, especially enhance the nutritional value of foods at industrial scales. In the health care industry, putting microbes to work has been demonstrated to save lives, both through the development of vaccines and biological control of vectors. However, one of the most important applications of microbial activity is exploiting them to produce energy from renewable carbon sources. Climate change and global warming are increasingly causing irreversible damage to the ecosystem and, if allowed to progress, could be an existential threat even bigger than the probability of a massive asteroid strike on earth, similar to the one that killed the dinosaurs.
References
Andersen, B., Poulsen, R., & Hansen, G. H. (2016). Cellulolytic and xylanolytic activities of common indoor fungi. International Biodeterioration & Biodegradation , 107 , 111-116.
Belda, I., Ruiz, J., Navascués, E., Marquina, D., & Santos, A. (2016). Improvement of aromatic thiol release through the selection of yeasts with increased β-lyase activity. International journal of food microbiology , 225 , 1-8.
Bueno, M. M., Thys, R. C. S., & Rodrigues, R. C. (2016). Microbial enzymes as substitutes of chemical additives in baking wheat flour—Part II: combined effects of nine enzymes on dough rheology. Food and bioprocess technology , 9 (9), 1598-1611.
Huang, X., Chen, X., Chen, Q., Yu, Q., Sun, D., & Liu, J. (2016). Investigation of functional selenium nanoparticles as potent antimicrobial agents against superbugs. Acta biomaterialia , 30 , 397-407.
Lipkie, T. E., Ferruzzi, M., & Weaver, C. M. (2016). Bioaccessibility of vitamin D from bread fortified with UV-treated yeast is lower than bread fortified with crystalline vitamin D2 and bovine milk. The FASEB Journal , 30 (1_supplement), 918-6.
Matuszewska, A. (2016). Microorganisms as Direct and Indirect Sources of Alternative Fuels. In Alternative Fuels, Technical and Environmental Conditions . IntechOpen.
Mohiddin, A., Lasim, A. M., & Zuharah, W. F. (2016). Susceptibility of Aedes albopictus from dengue outbreak areas to temephos and Bacillus thuringiensis subsp. israelensis. Asian Pacific journal of tropical biomedicine , 6 (4), 295-300.
Semkiv, M., Dmytruk, K., Abbas, C., & Sibirny, A. (2017). Biotechnology of glycerol production and conversion in yeasts. In Biotechnology of Yeasts and Filamentous Fungi (pp. 117-148). Springer, Cham.
Singh, R., Kumar, M., Mittal, A., & Mehta, P. K. (2017). Microbial metabolites in nutrition, healthcare and agriculture. 3 Biotech , 7 (1), 15.
Vitorino, L. C., & Bessa, L. A. (2017). Technological microbiology: development and applications. Frontiers in microbiology , 8 , 827.
Wang, L., Cao, Z., Hou, L., Yin, L., Wang, D., Gao, Q., ... & Wang, D. (2016). The opposite roles of agdA and glaA on citric acid production in Aspergillus niger. Applied microbiology and biotechnology , 100 (13), 5791-5803.
