Anemia affects one third of the world's population, most of which is iron deficiency related (Gupta et al. 2015). Anemia and similar mineral deficiency diseases are primarily widespread in developing countries like India, due to their diet mainly made up of cereal grains and seeds such as rice (O'Dell et al.1972). In these types of food, the iron bioavailability is substantially reduced by the presence of phytic acid (C₆H₁₈O₂₄P₆) that chelates minerals and form insoluble salts which precludes their absorption in the gastrointestinal tract.
Current research to increase the bioavailability of iron or zinc involves the bioengineering of crop plants which not only poses challenges in terms of the production of efficient genetically modified crops but also requires extensive research for drawing any conclusion on the strain sustainability (Gupta et al. 2015).
We propose an alternative strategy that focuses on the bioengineering of microorganisms involved in the fermentation of Idli, a dish widely used as primary food source in a large part of India. Indeed, the lab model organism Saccharomyces cerevisiae is a strain present in the Idli microbiome and that naturally produces phytases (Veide, 2006). Phytases are enzymes able to perform the hydrolysis of phytic acid even when chelated to minerals, resulting in a greater mineral bioavailability.
However the production of phytases in Saccharomyces cerevisiae in down-regulated by two genes : PHO80 present on the chromosome 15 and PHO85 on the chromosome 16. The knockout of these genes would most probably increase the yield of phytase production and therefore increase the general bioavailability of minerals in fermatation-based dished such as Idli.

Figure 2:Phytase hydrolyzes phytic acid.