Influence of nutritional and environmental factors on ethanol and endopolygalacturonase co-production by Kluyveromyces marxianus CCEBI

Ethanol and endopolygalacturonase (endoPG) are simultaneously produced by the yeast Kluyveromyces marxianus CCEBI 2011. The aim of this study was to determine the optimal combination of seven environmental and nutritional variables, as well as the influence of each one, with respect to the fermentation process in yeast cultures in which sugarcane juice was the substrate. Simplex sequential optimization showed that after 15 runs the optimal conditions were: pH, 4.6; temperature, 31oC; total reducing sugars (TRS), 125 g/l; (NH4)2SO4, 2.48 g/l; (NH4)2HPO4, 2.73 g/l; CaCl2, 0.33 g/l and MgSO4·7H2O, 0.54 g/l. Under these conditions, the ethanol concentration was 47.6 g/l and endoPG concentration was 9.8 U/ml, which represented increases of 22% and 10%, respectively, over the concentrations obtained under suboptimal conditions. Temperature and (NH4)2SO4 supplementation were the most significant factors influencing the co-production process. [Int Microbiol 2011; 14(1):41-49]