Heterologous expression and metabolic engineering tools for improving terpenoids production

[Display omitted] •Terpenoids make the largest group of natural products that contribute significantly to human disease therapy.•Heterologous expression and metabolic engineering tools play important roles in refining production of terpenoids.•More eukaryotic and photosynthetic chassis are required for the heterologous production of plant and fungi derived terpenoids.•Bioinformatics and synthetic biology techniques will play growing roles in heterologous expression of terpenoids. Terpenoids, also referred to as isoprenoids, are the largest group of natural compounds which have contributed significantly to the pharmaceutical industry. The challenges in producing bioactive terpenoids from their original host or by organic synthesis methods spurred the endeavors of producing terpenoids in heterologous host. Modern advances utilizing synthetic biology and biological engineering tools have provided a variety of pharmaceutical terpenoids in large-scale and with diversified structures. In this review, we will summarize the progress in production of typical terpenoids skeletons using heterologous expression method assisted by metabolic engineering techniques, with the purpose of enlightening further efforts in developing advanced cell factories for producing terpenoid based pharmaceuticals.