10 / 2021-06-06 01:09:11

Production of polyhydroxyalkanoate (PHA) biopolyesters by thermophilic bacteria using waste substrates.

Thermophilic fermentation, bioprocess, polyhydroxyalkanoates, waste feedstock, biopolymers

Thermophilic bacteria contributes to highly active and productive ecosystem, inducing the production of unique high value chemical products such as PHA. In industrial biotechnology, temperature is one of the critical parameter for production of industrially important metabolites. Thermophilic fermentation process is contemplated as energy efficient, as less cooling effects are needed. These processes are “self-heating” because of the heat energy produced by the bacterial metabolic activity with higher biomass concentration, which can be employed to the fermentation process. Due to these effects in turn lowers both the heating, cooling and sterility costs. Another additional advantage is, reduced risk of the contamination by ubiquitous mesophilic microflora, which is one of the important concern in bioprocess. Therefore, thermophilic bioprocess can be considered as potential tool for in vitro PHA synthesis. With this aim, potential thermophilic PHA producing bacteria can be isolated from activated sludge and could be further assessed for their PHA producing capacity by using various waste feedstocks. Representative high PHA yielding isolates can then processed for nutrients and C: N optimisation. With the optimised parameters, large scale fermentation can be operated, which will be discussed in the presentation.