Enzyme Design Methodologies to Enhance Enzymatic Yield

Enzyme design involves protein engineering to enhance its ability to catalyze certain reactions. The structure, function, and molecular network of proteins have been explored by biology/industrial researchers to decipher key active sites for customization and thus drive the directed evolution of the enzyme. Protein engineering in this context typically involves screening potential enzyme candidates using computational algorithms, while there is typically an intensive experimental protocol involving decoding and sequencing of the enzyme and the active site. Despite progress in research, the widespread use of directed evolution of enzymes and engineering of the proteins’ active site remains limited. Therefore, the importance of this “enzyme design” field has been accentuated.

The goal of this Research Topic is to provide a succinct and perspicuous guide to the different techniques deployed for the directed evolution of enzymes. Besides illustrating the usage of various state-of-the-art methodologies, aimed to increase the thermo-/ph-stability, activity, and enantiomeric affinity of an enzyme, the collection will provide an updated record of basic principles involved in designing a directed evolution experiment and the associated industrial and/or commercial applications.

This Research Topic welcomes submissions that exemplarily discuss various steps of the enzyme design approaches, taking into account industrial applications and viewpoints of end-users, and will cover themes such as, but not limited to:

• Screening methodologies to identify the most effective target enzymes
• Protein engineering techniques to functionally improve the active site
• Design techniques for tuning the active site against natural/non-natural substrate(s) to improve the productivity
• Overexpression of the target enzymes using the customized experimental methods
• Refining the reaction mechanism and bioprocesses to overcome rate-limiting steps