<
em>
Clostridium cellulovorans<
/em>
capable of producing large amounts of acetate and butyrate from cellulose is a promising candidate for biofuels and biochemicals production from lignocellulosic biomass. However, the restriction modification (RM) systems of <
em>
C. cellulovorans<
/em>
hindered the application of existing shuttle plasmids for metabolic engineering of this organism. To overcome the hurdle of plasmid digestion by host, a new shuttle plasmid (pYL001) was developed to remove all restriction sites of two major RM systems of <
em>
C. cellulovorans<
/em>
, <
em>
Cce<
/em>
<
sub>
743<
/sub>
I and <
em>
Cce<
/em>
<
sub>
743<
/sub>
II. The pYL001 plasmid remained intact after challenge by <
em>
C. cellulovorans<
/em>
cell extract. Post-electroporation treatments and culturing conditions were also modified to improve cell growth and colony formation on agar plates. With the improvements, the pYL001 plasmid, without in-vivo methylation, was readily transformed into <
em>
C. cellulovorans<
/em>
with colonies of recombinant cells formed on agar plates within 24 h. Three pYL001-derived recombinant plasmids free of <
em>
Cce<
/em>
<
sub>
743<
/sub>
I/<
em>
Cce<
/em>
<
sub>
743<
/sub>
II restriction sites, after synonymous mutation of the heterologous genes, were constructed and transformed into <
em>
C. cellulovorans<
/em>
. Functional expression of these genes was confirmed with butanol and ethanol production from glucose in batch fermentations by the transformants. In conclusion, the pYL001 plasmid and improved transformation method can facilitate further metabolic engineering of <
em>
C. cellulovorans<
/em>
for cellulosic butanol production.