Yeast Strain Development and Process Intensification in High-Gravity Fermentation.

High- and very-high-gravity fermentation enhances substrate loading and product titers, with potential to improve efficiency and sustainability across bioproduct industries.

• Why it matters: Optimizing fermentation at high gravity is crucial for reducing resource use and increasing productivity, but challenges like stress responses and transfer limitations hinder widespread adoption.
• What they did: The review covers yeast improvement methods—including adaptive evolution, mutagenesis, and genome editing—and process innovations such as no-cook saccharification and in situ product recovery, analyzing their roles in HG/VHG systems.
• The result: Findings indicate HG/VHG fermentation is a promising platform for process intensification, but its success relies on tailored strain development and process integration considering feedstock, conditions, and product goals.