Filamentous fungi from the genus Aspergillus are of high importance for biobased organic acid production. So far, a number of Aspergillus strains belonging to phylogenetically distantly related species have been successfully applied in industrial production of organic acids due to their excellent capabilities of secreting high amounts of desired organic acids. For the past decades, numerous efforts have been made to reveal the mechanisms of organic acid biosynthesis in several Aspergillus species and to improve the production of desired organic acids via genetic engineering. This review summarizes the recent breakthroughs in the fundamental understanding of physiological aspects of organic acid accumulation by fungal biocatalysts and highlights the progress in genetic engineering of aspergilli for organic acid production. The challenges for the future applications of aspergilli as commercial cell factories for organic acid production are also discussed.

曲霉属的丝状真菌对于生物基有机酸的生产非常重要。迄今为止，由于其分泌大量所需有机酸的优异能力，许多属于亲缘关系较远的物种的曲霉菌株已成功地用于有机酸的工业生产中。在过去的几十年中，已经做出了许多努力来揭示几种曲霉中有机酸生物合成的机制。并通过基因工程提高所需有机酸的产量。这篇综述总结了真菌生物催化剂对有机酸积累的生理方面的基本认识方面的最新突破，并着重介绍了用于生产有机酸的曲霉基因工程的进展。还讨论了曲霉菌作为商业细胞工厂生产有机酸的未来应用所面临的挑战。