5-HTP, a natural product with multiple functions, has been used as antidepressant, sleep aid and appetite suppressant over the world. Additionally, 5-HTP has been proved clinically effective for the  prevention of milk fever, a commonly occuring disease among farm animals that may cause substantial economic loss. Currently, the only commercialized approach for 5-HTP production is through solvent extraction from the seeds of Griffonia simplicifolia, a woody climbing shrub grown in west and central Africa. However, the insufficient and unstable supply of the raw material resulted in high and volatile price of 5-HTP, which greatly limited the expansion of its market. The high price largely constrained its broad use as an inexpensive antidepressant drug and affordable dietary supplement. Particularly, it is infeasible in terms economic viability for use as an animal feed supplement to control milk fever. To address these issues, BiotecEra is developing a novel microbial approach that allows the efficient, cost-effective and scalable production of 5-HTP. This technology is expected to significantly lower the production cost compared with the current botanical extraction method. At the same time, this technology can be readily scaled to secure the production of 5-HTP and satisfy the market needs. Importantly, the microbial approach is eco-friendly with few Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regulatory hurdles. Preliminary study has demonstrated the technical and economical feasibility for microbial production of 5-HTP. In this project, several problems directly related to its scale-up production will be addressed. First, antibiotic-free and inducer-free expression system will be developed, which will  dramatically reduce the production cost and eliminate relatedt environmental concerns. Secondly, the metabolic network will be optimized to achieve further improvement in 5-HTP production.