Gibberellic acid (GA₃) is a tetracyclic diterpenoid carboxylic acid synthesized by the secondary metabolism of Fusarium fujikuroi. This phytohormone is widely studied due to the advantages it offers as a plant growth regulator, such as growth stimulation, senescence delay, flowering induction, increased fruit size, and defense against abiotic or biotic stress, which improve the quality and yield of crops. Therefore, GA₃ has been considered as an innovative strategy to improve agricultural production. However, the yields obtained at large scale are insufficient for the current market demand. This low productivity is attributed to the lack of adequate parameters to optimize the fermentation process, as well as the complexity of its regulation. Therefore, this article describes the latest advances for potentializing the GA₃ production process, including an analysis of its origins from crops, the benefits of its application, the related biosynthetic metabolism, the maximum yields achieved from production processes, and their association with genetic engineering techniques for GA₃ producers. This work provides a new perspective on the critical points of the production process, in order to overcome the limits surrounding this modern line of bioengineering.

Fusarium fujikuroi is an industrial producer of gibberellic acid (GA₃), a phytohormone of agricultural interest. Despite the high concentration of nutrients used for its production, GA₃ yields remain low, highlighting the importance of identifying the major metabolites synthesized during GA₃ synthesis. Therefore, the principal aim of this work was to evaluate organic acid production during F. fujikuroi batch cultures by determining GA₃ production and organic acid profiles using Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) and liquid chromatography (HPLC) analysis. Significant differences in compound quantification were found; five organic acids, namely lactic, malic, citric, succinic and maleic, were detected by HPLC (in g/L: 101.09, 10.66, 2.80, 6.94 and 1.07, respectively). In addition, eight organic acids were determined by FTIR, namely lactic, butyric, pyruvic, fumaric, malic, succinic, maleic and oxalic (in g/L: 62.97, 19.19, 11.92, 7.54, 2.30, 4.36, 1.25 and 1.06 g/L, respectively). GA₃ production was also quantified, reaching nearly 5.0 g/L as determined by HPLC and UV-Vis, and FTIR yielded 2.20 g/L. This report found that the low yields obtained in GA₃ production are related to the side conversion of raw materials into organic acids as byproducts. In addition, the FTIR technique can be employed as an innovative strategy for the quantification of metabolites to provide relevant information on F. fujikuroi metabolic regulation. This enables the spread of its application as a biotechnological tool in high-value-added processes with potential for industrial-scale GA₃ production.