Patent ID: 8367379

Claim:
A transgenic cyanobacterium engineered to accumulate sucrose, wherein the cyanobacterium is transformed with an artificial DNA construct comprising operably associated components in the 5′ to 3′ direction of transcription: (i) a promoter that functions in a cyanobacterium; (ii) a polynucleotide selected from the group consisting of: (a) a polynucleotide comprising a nucleotide sequence encoding a polypeptide of SEQ ID NO: 2 or a polypeptide that is 95% identical to SEQ ID NO: 2, wherein the polypeptide has sucrose phosphate synthase and sucrose phosphate phosphatase (ASF) activity; (b) a polynucleotide comprising the nucleotide sequence of SEQ ID NO: 1 or a polynucleotide that is 95% identical to the nucleotide sequence of SEQ ID NO:1 that encodes a polypeptide having sucrose phosphate synthase and sucrose phosphate phosphatase (ASF) activity; (c) a polynucleotide that hybridizes under stringent conditions to the nucleotide sequence of SEQ ID NO: 1, wherein the polynucleotide encodes a polypeptide having sucrose phosphate synthase and sucrose phosphate phosphatase (ASF) activity, and wherein said stringent conditions comprise incubation at 65° C. in a solution comprising 6× SSC (0.9 M sodium chloride and 0.09 M sodium citrate); and (d) a polynucleotide that is a full complement of the polynucleotide of (a), (b), or (c); and iii) a transcriptional termination sequence, wherein the transgenic cyanobacterium has an increased level of sucrose compared to a cyanobacterium without the artificial DNA construct.