Patent ID: 7833761

Claim:
A method for producing an L-amino acid selected from the group consisting of L-lysine, L-tryptophan, L-phenylalanine, L-valine, L-leucine, L-isoleucine and L-serine comprising: A) culturing in a medium a microorganism which has an ability to produce the L-amino acid, and B) collecting the L-amino acid from the medium or the microorganism, wherein said microorganism has been modified to increase an activity of pyruvate synthase by a method selected from the group consisting of: i) increasing the copy number of a gene encoding pyruvate synthase, ii) modifying an expression control sequence of the gene, and iii) combinations thereof; and wherein pyruvate synthase is selected from the group consisting of: (a) a polypeptide comprising the amino acid sequence shown in SEQ ID NO: 2, and (b) a polypeptide comprising the amino acid sequence shown in SEQ ID NO: 2, but which includes between 1 and 20 substitutions, deletions, insertions, or additions, and has pyruvate synthase activity.