PubMed · 2026-04-03
Microbes like bacteria, fungi, and yeasts produce enzymes called lipases that break down fats, and scientists are now engineering these enzymes using AI, CRISPR, and genetic tools to make industrial processes cleaner and cheaper across food, fuel, pharmaceuticals, and more.
Microbial lipases from bacteria (including Bacillus, Pseudomonas, Alcaligenes) and fungi (including Penicillium) outperform plant- and animal-derived lipases in industrial settings due to broader substrate range and stability under extreme conditions.
Structural features like lid domains, interfacial activation, and catalytic triads directly govern enzyme performance, giving engineers precise targets for customization.
Combining metagenomics, CRISPR-Cas, synthetic biology, and AI-assisted modeling is accelerating discovery and design of lipases tailored for biofuel, pharmaceutical, food, detergent, textile, and leather industries.