Systems metabolic engineering of Escherichia coli for the heterologous production of high value molecules-a veteran at new shores.

For more than fifty years, Escherichia coli has represented a remarkable success story in industrial biotechnology. Traditionally known as a producer of l-amino acids, E. coli has also entered the precious market of high-value molecules and is becoming a flexible, efficient production platform for various therapeutics, pre-biotics, nutraceuticals and pigments. This tremendous progress is enabled by systems metabolic engineering concepts that integrate systems biology and synthetic biology into the design and engineering of powerful E. coli cell factories.