Designing the future of food fats: precision fermentation of Yarrowia lipolytica for tailored lipid production

Lipids are essential dietary components that contribute to human nutrition and food sensory properties. However, conventional lipid production has a high environmental footprint. Precision fermentation offers a viable alternative by tuning microbial metabolism to synthesize specific, high-value lipid fractions. Among available hosts, the oleaginous yeast Yarrowia lipolytica is frequently used as a preferred chassis organism because of its high natural lipid content, industrial robustness, safe status, and genetic tractability. This review highlights advances in Y. lipolytica engineering for tailored lipid production aimed at producing animal fat equivalents, cocoa butter, polyunsaturated fatty acids, and human milk lipid substitutes. Moreover, we discuss how advanced metabolic engineering, process optimization, and the use of low-cost feedstocks help close the price disparity with traditional lipid sources.