Efficient Recovery of Hyaluronic Acid from Highly Viscous Culture Broth

15 An efficient method for the separation and recovery of Hyaluronic Acid (HA) from highly viscous broth was developed. In this strategy, the separation of HA from viscous culture broth and purification by optimizing different parameters, viz., temperature, pH, treatment with activated charcoal, were included. In addition, concentrating the HA solution using ultrafiltration facilitated the reduction of the volume of isopropanol that is required for the recovery of HA. The viscosity of culture broth was greatly reduced by lowering its pH to 2.0 rather at neutral pH. The energy demand for the separation of HA from culture broth using centrifugation was considerably reduced by acidification of the culture broth. Moreover, the amount of alcohol required for the precipitation of HA was also reduced by concentrating purified HA solution using ultrafiltration with hollow-fiber membrane cartridge. Clinical grade HA can be produced by this process, and additionally, this strategy might be worthwhile for industrial scale purification.