Two complex wastes were considered for biological conversion into a marketable product. One waste, peat runoff water (the waste-water that remains after the mining of peat), was found to be unsuitable for biological conversion to any product since it contained an insufficient quantity of carbon. The other waste, NVR (non-volatile residue, the major waste from the manufacture of nylon 6$ sp prime 6 sp prime$), was found to be a suitable carbon and energy source for the production of PHB (poly-$ beta$-hydroxybutyric acid) by Pseudomonas cepacia ATCC 17697. A general approach to the development of complex toxic wastes as fermentation substrates was formulated. / NVR was found to be toxic to microorganisms. None grew in enrichment culture containing 2.0% NVR. P. cepacia was the most resistant microorganism found. It could grow well in up to 1.3% NVR. It also grew on butanoic, pentanoic, and hexanoic acid as well as 6-hexanolactone. These were found to be the major toxic components of NVR. P. cepacia was grown in a NVR-limited chemostat with a NVR feed concentration well in excess of the toxic NVR concentration. In nitrogen-limited, batch fermentation on fructose, P. cepacia accumulated PHB in excess of 50% of its dry weight. A 2-stage chemostat process for the production of PHB from NVR by P. cepacia was investigated with encouraging results.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:LACETR/oai:collectionscanada.gc.ca:QMM.75450 |
| Date | January 1987 |
| Creators | Ramsay, Bruce A. |
| Publisher | McGill University |
| Source Sets | Library and Archives Canada ETDs Repository / Centre d'archives des thèses électroniques de Bibliothèque et Archives Canada |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Coverage | Doctor of Philosophy (Department of Chemical Engineering.) |
| Rights | All items in eScholarship@McGill are protected by copyright with all rights reserved unless otherwise indicated. |
| Relation | alephsysno: 000550407, proquestno: AAINL44412, Theses scanned by UMI/ProQuest. |
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