Succinic acid Production from Bovine Rumen – Isolation and Optimization

In this study, a novel succinic acid producing bacterium was isolated from cow bovine rumen. Two bacteria’s are found to give better results for the production of succinic acid from the isolated colonies. Different synthetic carbon sources such as glucose, sucrose, fructose, dextrose, starch and cellulose and different crude carbon sources such as rice straw, sorghum stalk, baggase and sugar mill waste were studied. The fermentation process was carried out under CO2 atmosphere with N2 gas. The effect of pH, temperature and initial dextrose concentration were studied and optimized. The optimum fermentation conditions for the newly isolated strain were found to be: pH – 6.5, Temperature – 30C, Initial dextrose concentration – 10 g/L. At these optimized condition, the maximum production of succinic acid was found to be 15g/l.