With the rapid development of synthetic biology and metabolic engineering technologies, yeast has been generally considered as promising hosts for the bioproduction of secondary metabolites. Sterols are essential components of cell membrane, and are the precursors for the biosynthesis of steroid hormones, signaling molecules, and defense molecules in the higher eukaryotes, which are of pharmaceutical and agricultural significance. In this mini-review, we summarize the recent engineering efforts of using yeast to synthesize various steroids, and discuss the structural diversity that the current steroid-producing yeast can achieve, the challenge and the potential of using yeast as the bioproduction platform of various steroids from higher eukaryotes.

随着合成生物学和代谢工程技术的快速发展，酵母被普遍认为是次生代谢产物生物生产的有希望的宿主。甾醇是细胞膜的重要组成部分，是高等真核生物合成甾体激素、信号分子和防御分子的前体，具有药学和农业意义。在这篇小综述中，我们总结了最近利用酵母合成各种类固醇的工程努力，并讨论了当前生产类固醇的酵母可以实现的结构多样性、使用酵母作为各种类固醇生物生产平台的挑战和潜力来自高等真核生物。