A Sense of Design: Pathway Unravelling and Rational Metabolic Flow Switching for the Production of Novel Flavor Materials

The extraordinary diversity in chemicals encompassing flavors results from numerous integrated biosynthetic metabolic pathways. Metabolic engineering and synthetic biology have brought a new set of tools and methods that have created a significant impact on the development and have provided valuable insights into secondary metabolism. Moreover, systems metabolic engineering integrated with systems biology, synthetic biology, and evolutionary engineering along with traditional metabolic engineering will facilitate the development of new genetic tools and strategies. Significant progress in understanding these approaches holds great promise and offers a conceptual and technological framework to speed the creation of new metabolic enzymes and pathways or the modification of existing pathways for the optimal production of desired products. This chapter summarizes current findings regarding the genetic basis of flavor compounds with an aim toward highlighting areas in need of further studies.