ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on hydrogen and diols as fuels and polyhydroxyalkanoates (PHA) as the biopolymers. Biosynthesis of microbial diols is an exclusive model signifying the success of white biotechnology. The biosynthetic pathway involves three distinct enzymes of which PHA synthase is the limiting factor as the other two enzymes are normally present in almost all the organisms including eukaryotes. The major advantage of PHAs is their biodegradable nature as it is found to be completely decomposed into CO2 and water during composting. Various researchers suggest that white biotechnology could provide unique opportunities to produce platform chemicals in an eco-friendly and sustainable manner and help to build the circular economy. A few such diols are already popular in industrial biotechnology since they can be produced by uniquely developed strains on a large scale using cheap substrate materials. A cheap carbon source such as lignocellulose rich biomass could be a potential substrate for 2,3-butanediol due to obvious reasons.
