Studies on polyhydroxyalkanoate (PHA) accumulation in a PHA synthase I-negative mutant of Burkholderia cepacia generated by homogenotization

In the genome of Burkholderia cepacia strain IPT64, which accumulates a blend of the two homopolyesters poly(3-hydroxybutyrate), poly(3HB), and poly(3-hydroxy-4-pentenoic acid), poly(3H4PE), from sucrose or gluconate as single carbon source, the polyhydroxyalkanoate (PHA) synthase structural gene was disrupted by the insertion of a chloramphenicol-resistant gene cassette (phaC1::Cm). The suicide vector pSUP202 harboring phaC1::Cm was transferred to B. cepacia by conjugation. The inactivated gene was integrated into the chromosome of B. cepacia by homologous recombination. This mutant and also 15 N-methyl-N'-nitrosoguanidine (NMG)-induced mutants still accumulated low amounts of PHAs and expressed low PHA synthase activity. The analysis of the mutant phaC1::Cm showed that it accumulated about 1% of PHA consisting of 68.2 mol% 3HB and 31.8 mol% 3H4PE from gluconate. The wild-type, in contrast, accumulated 49.3% of PHA consisting of 96.5 mol% 3HB and 3. 5 mol% 3H4PE. Our results indicated that the genome of B. cepacia possesses at least two PHA synthase genes, which probably have different substrate specificities.