Secretion of Lignin Peroxidase H8 via the Flagellar Secretion Apparatus in Pseudomonas putida KT2440

Abstract

Producing useful chemicals from lignin, the second most abundant natural polymer, has been spotlighted for decades. However, only few microorganisms are known to have an ability to depolymerize lignin and utilize it. Among them, white rot fungi produce an enzyme lignin peroxidase H8 to decompose lignin into various chemicals including vanillin. We found out that Pseudomonas putida KT2440 has own unique metabolic pathways for aromatic compounds such as vanillin for carbon source. Here, we tried to express lignin peroxidase H8 in P. putida KT2440 and secrete directly via modified flagella to avoid forming inclusion body and achieve convenient whole-cell biotransformation of lignin. We deleted the fliC-D gene to construct modified flagella for secretion of FliC tagged lignin peroxidase H8.