Aspergillus, a genus of filamentous fungi, is extensively distributed in nature and plays crucial roles in the decomposition of organic materials as an important environmental microorganism as well as in the traditional fermentation and food processing industries. Furthermore, due to their strong potential to secrete a large variety of hydrolytic enzymes and other natural products by manipulating gene expression and/or introducing new biosynthetic pathways, several Aspergillus species have been widely exploited as microbial cell factories. In recent years, with the development of next-generation genome sequencing technology and genetic engineering methods, the production and utilization of various homo-/heterologous-proteins and natural products in Aspergillus species have been well studied. As a newly developed genome editing technology, the clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats/CRISPR-associated protein 9 (CRISPR/Cas9) system has been used to edit and modify genes in Aspergilli. So far, the CRISPR/Cas9-based approach has been widely employed to improve the efficiency of gene modification in the strain type Aspergillus nidulans and other industrially important and pathogenic Aspergillus species, including Aspergillus oryzae, Aspergillus niger, and Aspergillus fumigatus. This review highlights the current development of CRISPR/Cas9-based genome editing technology and its application in basic research and the production of recombination proteins and natural products in the Aspergillus species.

The adaptive evolution of cyanobacteria over a prolonged period has allowed them to utilize carbon dioxide (CO ₂ ) at the low concentrations found in the atmosphere (0.04% CO ₂ ) for growth. However, whether the exposure of cyanobacteria to high concentrations of CO ₂ results in oxidative stress and the activation of antioxidant defense response remains unknown, albeit fluctuations in other culture conditions have been reported to exert these effects. The current study reveals the physiological regulation of the model cyanobacterium Synechococcus elongatus PCC 7942 upon exposure to 1% CO ₂ and the underlying mechanism. Exposure to 1% CO ₂ was demonstrated to induce oxidative stress and activate antioxidant defense responses in S. elongatus . Further analysis of variations in metabolism between S. elongatus cells grown at 0.04% CO ₂ and exposed to 1% CO ₂ revealed that sulfate assimilation was enhanced after the exposure to 1% CO ₂ . A strain of S. elongatus lacking the gene cysR , encoding a global transcriptional regulator for genes involved in sulfate assimilation, was generated by deleting the gene from the genomic DNA. A comparative analysis of the wild-type and cysR -null strains indicated the regulation of the antioxidant response by sulfate assimilation. In addition, lines of evidence were presented that suggest a role of degradation of phycobilisome in the antioxidant response of S. elongatus under conditions of 1% CO ₂ and sulfate limitation. This study sheds light on the in situ effects of high CO ₂ -induced stress on the ecophysiology of cyanobacteria upon exposure to diverse scenarios from a biotechnological and ecological perspective. IMPORTANCE: Cyanobacteria that grow autotrophically with CO ₂ as the sole carbon source can be subject to high-CO ₂ stress in a variety of biotechnological and ecological scenarios. However, physiological regulation of cyanobacteria in response to high-CO ₂ stress remains elusive. Here, we employed microbial physiological, biochemical, and genetic techniques to reveal the regulatory strategies of cyanobacteria in response to high-CO ₂ stress. This study, albeit physiological, provides a biotechnological enterprise for manipulating cyanobacteria as the chassis for CO ₂ conversion and sheds light on the in situ ecological effects of high CO ₂ on cyanobacteria.

微生物种类及其含量监测是空间站内微生物控制的重要环节。但是空间环境的微重力条件及对资源的条件限制导致地面常规检测实验难以开展，因此在轨微生物检测主要依靠培养法。基于侧流层析试纸条的生物分子识别检测方法具有不受微重力环境影响的优点，耦合荧光检测方法可以达到较高的检测灵敏度，是在轨微生物检测的潜在方法之一。针对空间环境中对航天员生活环境及仪器仪表设备具有潜在危害的微生物，研究了一种基于环介导等温扩增（LAMP）耦合荧光侧流层析试纸条的微生物核酸鉴别技术。研究结果表明，该技术可实现对大肠杆菌、金黄色葡萄球菌等空间站常见有害微生物的高灵敏、高特异性、快速检测，检测时间小于60 min，灵敏度<100 copy·μL^–1。