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In the fast-paced modern life, do you often feel physically and mentally exhausted with low spirits?
Then why not try essential oil aromatherapy!
It is not merely a fragrance, but a gentle yet effective form of life therapy.
Life may be busy, but we can still find such a quiet corner—embrace ourselves gently with a wisp of natural scent. Let the aroma of essential oils become the most healing daily ritual in your life.
Among numerous essential oils, the most popular and recognized are rose essential oil, known as the "Queen of Flowers," and lavender essential oil, called the "All-purpose Guardian." The former’s core components are geraniol and citronellol; the latter’s is linalool. In natural compound synthesis, these three core components share highly similar terpenoid biosynthetic pathways. This commonality provides an unprecedented technical opportunity: by directionally modifying microbial cell factories to build a programmable biosynthetic platform, we can achieve on-demand synthesis of the key components of the two essential oils. We propose an innovative fermentation strategy that deeply integrates synthetic biology and metabolic engineering, enabling end-users to dynamically adjust the synthesis rate of each component based on personal preferences and ultimately obtain personalized mixed essential oil components in a single fermentation system at one time.
Traditional essential oil extraction methods are limited by plant variety, origin climate and extraction process, making it difficult to flexibly adjust component proportions. Our solution, however, relies on precisely designed microbial chassis (Saccharomyces cerevisiae and Escherichia coli). By enhancing precursor supply and introducing selective catalytic enzymes, we construct a metabolic network for efficient synthesis of geraniol, citronellol and linalool. The key lies in introducing regulatable promoter systems and artificial gene circuits, enabling precise regulation of the flux of each synthetic branch through external induction and culture parameters.
In the future, we plan to integrate machine learning algorithms with real-time metabolic flux analysis to establish a dynamic mapping model between user preferences and fermentation parameters. Users only need to input their preference for the aroma ratio of rose to lavender (e.g., 7:3 or 5:5), and the system will automatically optimize culture parameters and induction parameters to precisely allocate carbon flow to target products.
This highly integrated bio-manufacturing platform enables a paradigm shift from "mass production" to "personalized synthesis." It avoids activity loss caused by multiple extractions and physical mixing while significantly reducing production costs. In the future, this technology can be extended to other aromatic combinations sharing metabolic pathways (e.g., citrus and sandalwood, jasmine and ylang-ylang), ushering in a new era of "sensory customization" and ultimately driving the essential oil industry's transformation from agricultural extraction to sustainable bio-manufacturing.