Behaviour of the cell walls ofAspergillus nigerduring the autolytic phase of growth

Production of a generic microbial feedstock for lignocellulose biorefineries through sequential bioprocessing

Lignocellulosic materials, mostly from agricultural and forestry residues, provide a potential renewable resource for sustainable biorefineries. Reducing sugars can be produced only after a pre-treatment stage, which normally involves chemicals but can be biological. In this case, two steps are usually necessary: solid-state cultivation of fungi for deconstruction, followed by enzymatic hydrolysis using cellulolytic enzymes. In this research, the utilisation of solid-state bioprocessing using the fungus Trichoderma longibrachiatum was implemented as a simultaneous microbial pretreatment and in-situ enzyme production method for fungal autolysis and further enzyme hydrolysis of fermented solids. Suspending the fermented solids in water at 50°C led to the highest hydrolysis yields of 226mg/g reducing sugar and 7.7mg/g free amino nitrogen (FAN). The resultant feedstock was shown to be suitable for the production of various products including ethanol.

Fungal morphology and metabolite production in submerged mycelial processes

The use of fungi for the production of commercial products is ancient, but it has increased rapidly over the last 50 years. Fungi are morphologically complex organisms, differing in structure at different times in their life cycle, differing in form between surface and submerged growth, differing also with the nature of the growth medium and physical environment. Many genes and physiological mechanisms are involved in the process of morphogenesis. In submerged culture, a large number of factors contribute to the development of any particular morphological form. Factors affecting morphology include the type and concentration of carbon substrate, levels of nitrogen and phosphate, trace minerals, dissolved oxygen and carbon dioxide, pH and temperature. Physical factors affecting morphology include fermenter geometry, agitation systems, rheology and the culture modes, whether batch, fed-batch or continuous. In many cases, particular morphological forms achieve maximum performance. It is a very difficult task to deduce unequivocal general relationships between process variables, product formation and fungal morphology since too many parameters influence these interrelationships and the role of many of them is still not fully understood. The use of automatic image analysis systems during the last decade proved an invaluable tool for characterizing complex mycelial morphologies, physiological states and relationships between morphology and productivity. Quantified morphological information can be used to build morphologically structured models of predictive value. The mathematical modeling of the growth and process performance has led to improved design and operation of mycelial fermentations and has improved the ability of scientists to translate laboratory observations into commercial practice. However, it is still necessary to develop improved and new experimental techniques for understanding phenomena such as the mechanisms of mycelial fragmentation and non-destructive measurement of concentration profiles in mycelial aggregates. This would allow the establishment of a process control on a physiological basis. This review is focused on the factors influencing the fungal morphology and metabolite production in submerged culture.

Pulsed feeding during fed-batch fungal fermentation leads to reduced viscosity without detrimentally affecting protein expression

The goal in this study was to determine if pulsed addition of substrate could be used to alter filamentous fungal morphology during fermentation, to result in reduced broth viscosity. In all experiments, an industrially relevant strain of Aspergillus oryzae was grown in 20-liter fermentors. As a control, cultures were fed limiting substrate (glucose) continuously. Tests were performed by altering the feeding strategy so that the same total amount of glucose was fed in repeated 300-s cycles, with the feed pump on for either 30 or 150 s during each cycle. Variables indicative of cellular metabolic activity (biomass concentration, oxygen uptake rate, base consumed for pH control) showed no significant difference between continuous and pulse-fed fermentations. In addition, there was no significant difference between total extracellular protein expression or the apparent distribution of these proteins. In contrast, fungal mycelia during the second half of pulse-fed fermentations were approximately half the size (average projected area) of fungi during fermentations with continuous addition of glucose. As a result, broth viscosity during the second half of pulse-fed fermentations was approximately half that during the second half of continuous fermentations. If these results prove to be applicable for other fungal strains and processes, then this method will represent a simple and inexpensive means to reduce viscosity during filamentous fungal fermentation.

Estimation of hyphal tensile strength in production-scale Aspergillus oryzae fungal fermentations

Fragmentation of filamentous fungal hyphae depends on two phenomena: hydrodynamic stresses, which lead to hyphal breakage, and hyphal tensile strength, which resists breakage. The goal of this study was to use turbulent hydrodynamic theory to develop a correlation that allows experimental data of morphology and hydrodynamics to be used to estimate relative (pseudo) tensile strength (sigma(pseudo)) of filamentous fungi. Fed-batch fermentations were conducted with a recombinant strain of Aspergillus oryzae in 80 m(3) fermentors, and measurements were made of both morphological (equivalent hyphal length, L) and hydrodynamic variables (specific power input, epsilon; kinematic viscosity, v). We found that v increased over 100-fold during these fermentations and, hence, Kolmogorov microscale (lambda) also changed significantly with time. In the impeller discharge zone, where hyphal fragmentation is thought to actually take place, lambda was calculated to be 700-3500 microm, which is large compared to the size of typical fungal hyphae (100-300 microm). This result implies that eddies in the viscous subrange are responsible for fragmentation. Applying turbulent theory for this subrange, it was possible to calculate sigma(pseudo)from morphological and hydrodynamic measurements. Pseudo tensile strength was not constant but increased to a maximum during the first half and then decreased during the second half of each fermentation, presumably due to differences in physiological state. When a literature correlation for hyphal fragmentation rate (k(frag)) was modified by adding a term to account for viscosity and tensile strength, the result was better qualitative agreement with morphological data. Taken together, these results imply hyphal tensile strength can change significantly over the course of large-scale, fed-batch fungal fermentations and that existing fragmentation and morphology models may be improved if they accounted for variations in hyphal tensile strength with time.