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Ammonium acetate enhances solvent production by Clostridium acetobutylicum EA 2018 using cassava as a fermentation medium

  • Original Paper
  • Published:
Journal of Industrial Microbiology & Biotechnology

Abstract

Cassava, due to its high starch content and low cost, is a promising candidate substrate for large-scale fermentation processes aimed at producing the solvents acetone, butanol and ethanol (ABE). However, the solvent yield from the fermentation of cassava reaches only 60% of that achieved by fermenting corn. We have found that the addition of ammonium acetate (CH3COONH4) to the cassava medium significantly promotes solvent production from cassava fermented by Clostridium acetobutylicum EA 2018, a mutant with a high butanol ratio. When cassava medium was supplemented with 30 mM ammonium acetate, the acetone, butanol and total solvent production reached 5.0, 13.0 and 19.4 g/l, respectively, after 48 h of fermentation. This level of solvent production is comparable to that obtained from corn medium. Both ammonium (NH4 +) and acetate (CH3COO−) were required for increased solvent synthesis. We also demonstrated substantially increased acetic and butyric acid accumulation during the acidogenesis phase as well as greater acid re-assimilation during the solventogenesis period in ammonium acetate-supplemented cassava medium. Reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction analysis indicated that the transcription of several genes encoding enzymes related to acidogenesis and solventogenesis in C. acetobutylicum EA 2018 were enhanced by the addition of ammonium acetate to the cassava medium.

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Acknowledgments

We are grateful to Prof. Peng Zhang, Dr. Jiping Shi and Mr. Zhaobing Shen for their helpful suggestions and for providing cassava. We thank Dr. Wenping Wu for providing pullulanase and Dr. Weiwen Zhang for editing the text. This work was supported by the National Basic Research Program of China (973: 2007CB707803), the National High-tech Research and Development Program of China (863: 2006AA02Z237; 863: 2007AA05Z407) and the Knowledge Innovation Program of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (KSCX2-YW-G-007).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Key Laboratory of Synthetic Biology, Institute of Plant Physiology and Ecology, Shanghai Institutes for Biological Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 200032, Shanghai, People’s Republic of China

    Yang Gu, Shiyuan Hu, Jun Chen, Lijun Shao, Huiqi He, Yunliu Yang, Sheng Yang & Weihong Jiang

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  1. Yang Gu
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  2. Shiyuan Hu
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  3. Jun Chen
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  4. Lijun Shao
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  5. Huiqi He
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  6. Yunliu Yang
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  7. Sheng Yang
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  8. Weihong Jiang
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Correspondence to Sheng Yang or Weihong Jiang.

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Gu, Y., Hu, S., Chen, J. et al. Ammonium acetate enhances solvent production by Clostridium acetobutylicum EA 2018 using cassava as a fermentation medium. J Ind Microbiol Biotechnol 36, 1225–1232 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10295-009-0604-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10295-009-0604-1

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