Mycology

Fungal Biomanufacturing

Fungi represent a cornerstone of industrial biotechnology, serving as indispensable platforms for the production of enzymes, organic acids, and high-value pharmaceuticals. In the era of synthetic biology and green manufacturing, the engineering of fungal cell factories offers unparalleled opportunities to address global challenges in sustainability, human health, and the circular bioeconomy. This article collection aims to capture the cutting-edge advances in fungal biomanufacturing, ranging from foundational metabolic engineering to the development of robust industrial strains.

Filamentous fungi and yeasts are powerful platforms for sustainable chemical production. As industries shift away from petrochemical-based processes, engineered fungal cell factories offer a renewable route to high-value compounds—from therapeutic alkaloids to biodegradable polymers. By integrating cutting-edge tools like CRISPR-Cas9, biosensors, and dynamic pathway regulation, we can overcome long-standing bottlenecks in titer, rate, and yield. Furthermore, linking fungal biomanufacturing with medicinal plant biomass valorization directly supports the circular bioeconomy, reduces agricultural waste, and enables the sustainable production of bioactive natural products that are otherwise difficult to source.

This collection will serve as a platform for presenting innovative strategies that bridge the gap between laboratory-scale design and industrial-scale application, emphasizing the critical role of fungi in shaping a sustainable manufacturing future. We invite contributions that explore the full spectrum of fungal biotechnology, with a focus on leveraging the unique metabolic versatility of yeast and filamentous fungi. Topics of interest include the design and optimization of fungal cell factories for the sustainable production of biofuels, biopolymers, and high-value natural products. We particularly welcome studies that integrate systems biology, CRISPR-based genome editing, and process engineering to overcome current bottlenecks in titers, yields, and rate of products. Additionally, given the growing significance of traditional medicine and functional foods, this issue will highlight the role of fungal systems in the herb bioprocessing to produce bioactive compounds.

Topics of Interest in details:

• Development and optimization of Saccharomyces, Yarrowia, and non-conventional yeasts for industrial applications.
• Pathway construction, flux optimization, and dynamic regulation in fungal hosts.
• Development of genetic parts, CRISPR-Cas9/12 tools, and biosensors for fungal systems.
• Heterologous biosynthesis of terpenoids, flavonoids, alkaloids, polyketides, and fungal secondary metabolites.
• Biotransformation, valorization, and sustainable production of bioactive compounds from medicinal plant biomass.
• Morphology engineering and harnessing Aspergillus, Trichoderma, and Basidiomycetes for enzyme and chemical production.
• Bioprocess design, scaling-up strategies, and techno-economic analysis for fungal-based manufacturing.

 keywords:

1. Yeast cell factories
2. Metabolic engineering
3. Synthetic biology
4. Natural products
5. Herb bioprocessing
6. Filamentous fungi
7. CRISPR-Cas9
8. Sustainable bioprocesses

Guest Advisors

Yongjun Wei, Ph.D, currently work as an Associate Professor at the School of Pharmaceutical Sciences and Laboratory of Synthetic Biology, Zhengzhou University, China. He serves as the director of Henan Province Engineering Technology Research Center for Fermentation of Chinese Veterinary Drugs. His research interest is synthetic microbiology, with a focus on applying microbiota and synthetic biology in addressing human health issues. To date, he has published more than 100 papers with over 3500 citations. For further details about Dr. Wei’s professional profile, please visit https://www7.zzu.edu.cn/synbio/info/1067/1061.htm?_refluxos=a10 or https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1554-1999.

Dr. Boyang Ji is a Scientific Data Developer at BioInnovation Institute in Copenhagen, Denmark. He previously worked with Prof. Jens Nielsen at Chalmers University of Technology and DTU (2013-2020). His research focuses on genome-scale metabolic modeling of fungal cell factories, machine learning for strain optimization, and multi-omics integration for fungal production systems, with applications in pharmaceuticals, enzymes, and bio-based chemicals. For further details about Dr. Ji’s professional profile, please visit https://bii.dk/about/employees/ or https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7269-4342.

Disclosure Statement: Guest Advisors declare no conflict of interest regarding this work.

All manuscripts submitted to this Article Collection will undergo a full peer-review. Please review the journal scope and author submission instructions prior to submitting a manuscript.

To submit your papers to this Article Collection, please:

1. Check "yes" for the question, "Are you submitting your paper for a specific special issue or article collection?"
2. Select the Article Collection ‘Fungal Biomanufacturing’ from the drop-down menu under the question, "Special Issue or Article Collection Name."

Please contact Changluan Zhou at [email protected] with any queries and discount codes regarding this Article Collection.