Study of Growth Kinetic Models of a Methanotroph Bacterium Growing on Natural Gas

Kinetics of single cell protein production from natural gas by a microorganism (a Methylomonas sp.) was studied experimentally and by modeling at equal amount of air and natural gas. Kinetic models of Monod, Moser, Teissier, Aiba, Andrews, and Noack were used for illustrating cell growth. Methane and oxygen were considered as limited substrates with concentration in the range 2-10 mg/lit. Death coefficient is considered variable versus time for predicting stationary and death phase. The results showed that mathematical models could describe dynamic of biomass production from lag to death phase. Kinetic parameters were achieved by tuning with experimental data. Further, the results showed that, Monod and Moser models can correlate the experimental data very well.