Anastasia Ward

Heterologous biosynthesis of natural products frequently encounters great challenges, including enzyme promiscuity and metabolic burden, particularly in those with long biosynthetic pathways (Cheah et al., 2023; Chen et al., 2019; Sun et al., 2022). The promiscuity in enzyme activity often leads to the generation of by-products and seriously decreases the efficiency of the intricate biosynthetic routes (Brooks et al., 2023; Liu et al., 2024; Qiu et al., 2022).

1. Introduction Cystic fibrosis (CF) is the most common debilitating and potentially lethal autosomal recessive genetic disorder, affecting an estimated 70,000–90,000 people globally [1]. CF is caused by mutations in the cystic fibrosis transmembrane conductance regulator (CFTR) genes, resulting in the CFTR protein becoming deficient, dysfunctional, or completely absent.