Fan Wang

This chapter describes the microbial diversity and interactions underlying the production of fermented dairy products, meats, tea, coffee, chocolate, and tobacco. It summarizes how raw materials, processing parameters, and environmental factors shape microbial communities and their metabolic activities, ultimately determining flavor, texture, and functional qualities. Microbial cooperation and succession drive key biochemical transformations that influence product characteristics. With advances in microbial omics, strain identification and functional analysis now enable more precise control of fermentation, improved quality and safety, and the development of novel functional products. The chapter also highlights future directions in high-dimensional omics and targeted fermentation.

Fermented foods represent a cornerstone of global culinary traditions, underpinned by intricate microbial communities that drive flavor development and preservation. This chapter examines the microbial ecology and functional interactions across representative staple and traditional fermented foods, including fermented vegetables (sauerkraut, kimchi), fermented condiments (soy sauce, vinegar, miso, doubanjiang), and fermented alcoholic beverages (Chinese baijiu, wine, sake, Huangjiu). Recent meta-omics advances have revealed dynamic community succession, cross-feeding networks, quorum-sensing mechanisms, and key microorganisms contributing to flavor metabolites and health-promoting compounds. Furthermore, synthetic microbial communities and starter engineering are discussed as strategies to standardize fermentation, enhance quality, and develop novel functional products.

Glucose oxidase, which uses molecular oxygen as an electron acceptor to specifically catalyze the conversion of β-d-glucose to gluconic acid and hydrogen peroxide (H₂O₂), has been considered an important enzyme in increasing environmental sustainability and food security. However, achieving the high yield, low price and high activity required for commercial viability remains challenging. In this review, we first present a brief introduction, looking at the sources, characteristics, catalytic process, and applications of glucose oxidase. Then, the predictive structures of glucose oxidase from two different sources are comparatively discussed. We summarize the inhibitors of glucose oxidase. Finally, we highlight how the production of glucose oxidase can be improved by optimizing the culture conditions and microbial metabolic engineering.

Tobacco stalk (TS), a major agricultural waste abundant in pectin, has resulted in concerns about the need for its reuse. The nicotine in TS is considered a chemical that is to\xic and hazardous to the environment. In this study, Bacillus tequilensis CAS-MEI-2-33 was isolated from cigar wrappers to produce alkaline pectinase using TS. Subsequently, the medium and fermentation conditions for the production of pectinase by B. tequilensis CAS-MEI-2-33 were optimized. The optimal fermentation period, pH of the initial fermentation medium, concentration of TS, and inoculum amount for B. tequilensis CAS-MEI-2-33 were 40 h, 40 g/L, 7.0, and 3%, respectively. Under optimal conditions, the pectinase activity was 1370 U/mL. Then, the enzymatic properties, such as the optimum pH, reaction temperature, temperature stability, and effects of metal ions, were studied. The optimal pH was determined to be 10.0, indicating that the enzyme was an alkaline pectinase. The optimal temperature was 40 °C, and pectinase activity was stable at 40 °C. The Ag+ metal ions were shown to remarkably promote enzyme activity. The pectinase was partly purified by ammonium sulfate precipitation, ion exchange chromatography, and Sephacryl S-100 chromatography. Sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (SDS-PAGE) and LC-MS/MS analyses were utilized to analyze the pectinase. This study provided a new alkaline pectinase candidate and a new strategy for the use of TS.

Natural rubber is a kind of indispensable biopolymers with great use and strategic importance in human society. However, its production relies almost exclusively on rubber-producing plants Hevea brasiliensis, which have high requirements for growth conditions, and the mechanism of natural rubber biosynthesis remains largely unknown. In the past two decades, details of the rubber chain polymerization and proteins involved in natural rubber biosynthesis have been investigated intensively. Meanwhile, omics and other advanced biotechnologies bring new insight into rubber production and development of new rubber-producing plants. This review summarizes the achievements of the past two decades in understanding the biosynthesis of natural rubber, especially the massive information obtained from the omics analyses. Possibilities of natural rubber biosynthesis in vitro or in genetically engineered microorganisms are also discussed.

Selection of optimal primer pairs in 16S rRNA gene sequencing is a pivotal issue in microorganism diversity analysis. However, limited effort has been put into investigation of specific primer sets for analysis of the bacterial diversity of aging flue-cured tobaccos (AFTs), as well as prediction of the function of the bacterial community. In this study, the performance of four primer pairs in determining bacterial community structure based on 16S rRNA gene sequences in AFTs was assessed, and the functions of genes were predicted using Phylogenetic Investigation of Communities by Reconstruction of Unobserved States (PICRUSt). Results revealed that the primer set 799F–1193R covering the amplification region V5V6V7 gave a more accurate picture of the bacterial community structure of AFTs, with lower co-amplification levels of chloroplast and mitochondrial genes, and more genera covered than when using the other primers. In addition, functional gene prediction suggested that the microbiome of AFTs was involved in kinds of interested pathways. A high abundance of functional genes involved in nitrogen metabolism was detected in AFTs, reflecting a high level of bacteria involved in degrading harmful nitrogen compounds and generating nitrogenous nutrients for others. Additionally, the functional genes involved in biosynthesis of valuable metabolites and degradation of toxic compounds provided information that the AFTs possess a huge library of microorganisms and genes that could be applied to further studies. All of these findings provide a significance reference for researchers working on the bacterial diversity assessment of tobacco-related samples.