A review of CRISPR-engineered microbial consortia for biodegradation of petroleum pollutants

The pollutants associated to petroleum are becoming an issue of consistent danger to both terrestrial and marine organisms as they are difficult to degrade and hydrophobic and also affect the toxicological properties. High costs of operations, inadequate degradation and secondary pollution often are a drawback to typical physicochemical remediation techniques. Conversely, microbial biodegradation provides a green, environment-friendly solution especially when using microbial consortia which exploits synergistic metabolic pathways. This is starting to change because genome editing using CRISPR-Cas systems has recently made it possible to rationally design such consortia, to rationally optimize catabolic pathways, to optimize interspecies interactions, and to incorporate biosafety mechanisms prior to release into the environment. The present review is a synthesis of the recent advancement of developing and using CRISPR-designed microbial consortia in the removal of hydrocarbons, particularly focusing on strain selection, pathway optimization, and genetic protection modifications. We discuss how synthetic biology could be used to modulate these consortia to be used in water and waste water cleaning facilities, including the desalination facilities, in which engineered biofilms and bioreactors could easily dispose of the oil contaminated effluent. The article as well touches on such critical challenges as off target editing, genetic drift, ecological variability, and limitation of scalability, regulatory factors along with acceptability to the people. CRISPR-based approaches provide a strong strategy to develop next-generation bioremediation platforms as combined multi-omics, systems biology, and bioprocess engineering strategies allow developing more efficient bioremediation platforms. The review gives a guide to the further investigation aimed at translating laboratory-developed systems into safe, effective, and flexible technologies to restore the world environment.