Microbial oils as nutraceuticals and animal feeds

45 p.-5 fig.-3 tab.Lipids and oils are produced by all single-cell organisms for essential structural and functional roles; however, the term single cell oils (SCOs) is mainly restricted to describe the lipids produced by a limited number of oleaginous microorganisms (archaea, bacteria, yeast, fungi, and microalgae) with oil contents higher than 20% of biomass weigh. SCOs have different fatty acid compositions from those of plant seed or fish oils and are nowadays considered as new sources of nutraceuticals and animal feeds. In spite of the current commercial success of some SCOs, the development of more efficient microbial fermentation processes and the possibility of manipulating by systems metabolic engineering the lipid composition of cells require new biotechnological strategies to obtain high yields of the desired SCOs. Understanding the synthesis and regulatory mechanisms involved in the production of SCOs is fundamental to eliminate the metabolic bottlenecks that impair achieving high oil yields.This chapter is supported by grants from the Community of Madrid and the Structural Funds of the European Union (Ref: S2013/ABI2783 (INSPIRA1-CM)), the Ministry of Economy, the Industry and Competitiveness (Ref: RTC-2016-4860-2; Ref: BFU2014-55534-C2-1-P), and the Intramural Program of the CSIC (Ref: 201420E086) and the H2020 FET-OPEN program (LIAR: Ref 686585).Peer reviewe