Multichromatic Dynamic Control of Multi-Membered Microbial Consortia Compositions for Chemical Production

Engineered microbial consortia offer a promising strategy for chemical production by distributing specialized functions among microbial strains, reducing metabolic burden, facilitating modular pathway optimization, reducing toxicity, and increasing strain stability. However, differences in growth rates can destabilize population composition, compromising productivity and limiting their applicability. Here, we developed a multichromatic optogenetic Toxin-Antitoxin (optogeneticTA) platform for dynamic control of Escherichia coli consortia of up to four members using blue, red, and near-infrared light and darkness. By varying light intensities or pulses, we precisely program and dynamically modulate the population composition of two-, three-, and four-membered consortia. We further developed a modular mathematical framework that captures and predicts population dynamics of these optogenetically controlled co-cultures. Applying dynamic control to a two-membered engineered consortium increased phenol production by ~69% relative to unregulated consortia. These results establish a programmable platform for stabilizing and dynamically optimizing microbial consortia, with potential applications across microbial biomanufacturing.