A wide number of bacteria have the capabilities of synthesizing many types of industrial chemicals and pharmaceuticals that are helpful to our environment and nutrition. Microbes can synthesize amino acids, various types of enzymes, vitamins, pharmaceuticals, and many other things. Amino acids can be synthesized from several different types of microbes.
Amino acids are important to our bodies because they are the building blocks of proteins.
Microbes can also be used commercially to produce artificial sweeteners. These three amino acids are all used commercially as sweetening agents. However, it is not that easy to synthesize these amino acids. There are many factors that are needed in order for synthesis of the right amino acid to occur. Most of the time, selected mutants and clever ways of manipulating a microbe's metabolic pathway are what lead to the synthesis of the desired amino acids.