Recent advances in microbial consortia present a valuable approach for expanding the scope of metabolic engineering. Systems biology enable thorough understanding of diverse physiological processes of cells and their interactions, which in turn offers insights into the optimal design of synthetic microbial consortia. Yet, the study of synthetic microbial consortia is still in early infancy, facing many unknowns and challenges in intercellular communication and construction of stable and controllable microbial consortia systems. In this review, we comprehensively discussed the recent application of defined microbial consortia in the fields of human health monitoring and medicine exploitation, valuable compounds synthesis, consolidated bioprocessing of lignocellulosic materials and environmental bioremediation. Moreover, the outstanding challenges and future directions to advance the development of high-efficient, stable and controllable synthetic microbial consortia were highlighted.

微生物联合体的最新进展为扩大代谢工程的范围提供了一种有价值的方法。系统生物学使人们能够全面了解细胞的各种生理过程及其相互作用，从而反过来提供了对合成微生物聚生体的最佳设计的见识。然而，合成微生物菌群的研究仍处于初期阶段，在细胞间通讯以及稳定和可控制的微生物菌群系统的构建方面面临许多未知数和挑战。在这篇综述中，我们全面讨论了已定义的微生物联盟在人体健康监测和药物开发，有价值的化合物合成，木质纤维素材料的整合生物加工以及环境生物修复等领域的最新应用。而且，