Screening of monascus SPP. and regulation effects of quorum sensing molecules and co-factors based on tocopherol high-accumulation

Tocopherol is one of the widely consumed nutritional supplements and antioxidants. Previous studies have found that tocopherol could be high-accumulation in fermentation coix seed (FC). This study screened Monascus SPP . with high tocopherol accumulation and investigated the effects of quorum sensing molecules (QSMs) and co-factors on FC. The results showed that the accumulation of tocopherol on FC by M.rubiginosus was the most significant (23.37 ± 0.26 mg/kg). Under the optimized fermentation conditions (10 % water added to substrates, 28 °C, and 10 days), the accumulation of total tocopherol was 67.39 ± 2.44 mg/kg, which was increased by 2.88 times. Six kinds of QSM could further promote the accumulation of tocopherol, especially L-phenylalanine, L-tyrosine, and tyrosol . The addition of L-phenylalanine in M.rubiginosus -FC had an excellent effect of accumulation of tocopherol to 160.74 mg/kg. Eight kinds of co-factors could promote tocopherol accumulation, and SDS was the most effective, increasing tocopherol accumulation by 1.77 times. Some of the QSM and co-factors promoted to accumulate tocopherols and enriched the structural types. The accumulation of β-tocopherol was about 74.44 mg/kg with the addition of 15 mM L-phenylalanine. In summary, this study provides a reference strain, regulatory factors and strategy for the future industrial production of tocopherols by fermentation, and improves the value of intensive processing of coix rice.