Eficience of Zymomonas mobilis CCT4494 immobilization on pineapple and orange peels aimed levan production

• Grant number: 13/00478-8
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Start date: April 01, 2013
• End date: March 31, 2014
• Field of knowledge: Agronomical Sciences - Food Science and Technology
• Principal Investigator: Crispin Humberto Garcia Cruz
• Grantee: Bruna Caroline da Silva Lima
• Host Institution: Instituto de Biociências, Letras e Ciências Exatas (IBILCE). Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP). Campus de São José do Rio Preto. São José do Rio Preto , SP, Brazil

Abstract

An alternative method to increase fermentation processes efficiency using conventional free cells in the fermentation medium is immobilization of cells. For any immobilization technique success is essential to use nontoxic, low cost supports and efficient microbial adhesion. Thus, the aim of this study is to evaluate the efficiency of Zymomonas mobilis CCT4494 immobilization on pineapple and orange peels to levan production. The bacterium will be reactivated in ZM medium and cultured in pre-fermentation for 24 hours at 30 ºC, without stirring. The pineapple and orange peels previously dried at 70-80 ° C for 24 hours will be broken into standardized size and a standard amount of these peels will be sterilized and added to 50 mL of immobilization medium and incubated at 30 ° C for 24 hours at 150 rpm. After, the peels will be washed with distilled water and added the same volume of distilled water for biomass determination. Biomass will be determined by spectrophotometry and levan production of will be obtained by Viikari technique (1984) with some modifications. (AU)