Complete Cell-Free Conversion of Glucose to Hydrogen

Biohydrogen has great potential as a future transportation fuel and commodity chemical.  Cell-free production of hydrogen offers numerous engineering advantages, such as increased reaction rates, lack of competing pathways, and minimization of biocatalyst cost per unit product.  Previous studies from our group have demonstrated the conversion of starch and cellulosic substrates to hydrogen, using such a cell-free synthetic pathway biotransformation (1,2).  In this study, we broaden the substrate range to include monomeric glucose without the use of ATP, increase the reaction rate by an order of magnitude, and demonstrate complete conversion for the first time. 

1. Y.-H.P. Zhang, B.R. Evans, J.R. Mielenz, R.C. Hopkins, M.W.W. Adams, PLoS One, 2 (2007) e456.
2. X. Ye, Y. Wang, R.C. Hopkins, M.W.W. Adams, B.R. Evans, J.R. Mielenz, Y.-H.P. Zhang, ChemSusChem, 2 (2009) 149-152.