Engineered

Catechol is an industrially relevant chemical with myriad applications. Its production via chemical route suffers from several drawbacks the major being a non-green and nonselective route. Currently, bio-based products using biocatalyst are gaining attention due to the growing environmental and health hazards concerns over the use of petroleum-derived feedstock. Lignocellulosic biomass serves as a promising feedstock. Lignin valorization is the demand of the current scenario which is complicated task by its complexity, heterogeneity and diversity of lignin structures posing limitations toward lignin valorization via chemical routes. There are several microorganisms that possess the ability to metabolize lignin monomers via their central metabolic pathways and this paves the way to the synthesis of a number of products.