Cost-Effective Production of L-DOPA by Tyrosinase-Immobilized Polyhydroxyalkanoate Nanogranules in Engineered Halomonas bluephagenesis TD01.

3,4-dihydroxyphenyl-L-alanine (L-DOPA) is a preferred drug for Parkinson’s disease, with an increasing demand worldwide that mainly relies on costly and environmentally problematic chemical synthesis. Yet, biological L-DOPA production is unfeasible at the industrial scale due to its low L-DOPA yield and high production cost. In this study, low-cost Halomonas bluephagenesis TD01 was engineered to produce tyrosinase TyrVs-immobilized polyhydroxyalkanoate (PHA) nanogranules in vivo, with the improved PHA content and increased immobilization efficiency of TyrVs accounting for 6.85% on the surface of PHA. A higher L-DOPA-forming monophenolase activity of 518.87 U/g PHA granules and an L-DOPA concentration of 974.36 mg/L in 3 h catalysis were achieved, compared to those of E. coli. Together with the result of L-DOPA production directly by cell lysates containing PHA-TyrVs nanogranules, our study demonstrated the robust and cost-effective production of L-DOPA by H. bluephagenesis, further contributing to its low-cost industrial production based on next-generation industrial biotechnology (NGIB).