Bio-plastics have emerged as a promising alternative to conventional petrochemical derived plastics particularly over the past few decades. Numerous production methods for bio-plastics have been researched; however, work remains towards developing a commercially viable and economical process. The purpose of this research was to develop a sustainable fermentation strategy for production and scale-up of medium-chain length polyhydroxyalkanoates (mcl-PHAs), or bio-plastics, using a novel strain of the gram negative bacterium Pseudomonas putida, LS46, with biodiesel derived waste glycerol (WG) as feedstock. Experiments were conducted to gain a basic understanding of the general growth patterns exhibited by LS46. Thereafter, flask-batch experiments were conducted to study effects of variation in media conditions upon cell biomass production and mcl-PHA accumulation. Subsequently, optimal medium conditions observed within flasks were scaled-up and employed in the operation of a pilot-scale fermenter to increase production capacity for mcl-PHAs. It was concluded that mcl-PHA production at commercial levels could be viable with advanced process optimization. / October 2015
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:MANITOBA/oai:mspace.lib.umanitoba.ca:1993/30658 |
| Date | January 1900 |
| Creators | Sharma, Umesh |
| Contributors | Cicek, Nazim (Biosystems Engineering), Levin, David (Biosystems Engineering) Sparling, David (Microbiology) |
| Publisher | Not applicable |
| Source Sets | University of Manitoba Canada |
| Detected Language | English |
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