Investigation of Effective Immobilization Method for Ethanol Producing E. coli Strain

Abstract

There is a growing interest to find alternative cheap carbon sources for bioethanol production. Whey powderis a by-product of cheese industry with high lactose content. Immobilization of bacteria is an effectivemethod for enhancing production of their metabolites including bioethanol. In this work, a new and effectiveimmobilization method for bioethanol production from whey powder as a cheap/renewable carbon sourcewas investigated. For this, different immobilization methods were evaluated to avoid disruption of beadstructures during ethanol fermentation. The best results were obtained when sodium alginate was sterilizedunder the UV lamp instead of heating for immobilization, and the fermentation media was supplementedwith CaCl 2 as a stability factor. In addition, the beads were successfully reused in at least three 48 h batchfermentations for ethanol production.