Aspergillus as a versatile cell factory for organic acid production

Filamentous fungi from the genus Aspergillus are of high importance for biobased organic acid production. So far, a number of Aspergillus strains belonging to phylogenetically distantly related species have been successfully applied in industrial production of organic acids due to their excellent capabilities of secreting high amounts of desired organic acids. For the past decades, numerous efforts have been made to reveal the mechanisms of organic acid biosynthesis in several Aspergillus species and to improve the production of desired organic acids via genetic engineering. This review summarizes the recent breakthroughs in the fundamental understanding of physiological aspects of organic acid accumulation by fungal biocatalysts and highlights the progress in genetic engineering of aspergilli for organic acid production. The challenges for the future applications of aspergilli as commercial cell factories for organic acid production are also discussed. (C) 2016 British Mycological Society. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.