From metabolic engineering to synthetic biology

For the production of molecules of interest, laboratories have long had at their disposal chemical synthesis and - much more recently   - the tools of metabolic engineering and synthetic biology. A precise definition of these different fields is given in order to highlight their specificities, differences, respective advantages and disadvantages. It seems that, in the future, industry will choose to use these different tools according to the target it is aiming for. In the pharmaceutical field, for example, despite the development of biology and the real prospects for biomedicines (antibodies, vaccines, hormones, etc.), gene therapy and cell therapy, the majority of drugs on the market are still small synthetic molecules. Nevertheless, great success has been achieved with the development of metabolic engineering, which uses modified organisms for the biotechnological production of molecules of interest. Several interesting examples are shown in detail: synthesis of a vitamin by a fungus, synthesis of alcohols by modified yeast or bacteria, synthesis of artemisinin, a fast-developing antimalarial drug.