Fermentative lactic acid production from seaweed hydrolysate using Lactobacillus sp. And Weissella sp
Graphical abstract
Introduction
Lactic acid (LA) is one of the key commodity chemicals for which the bio-based product occupies 100% of the market share (Cesário et al., 2018). LA has varied applications in the biomedical, food, chemicals, personal care, pharmaceutical, and bioplastic industries (Castillo Martinez et al., 2013). The current annual production of LA is 0.81 million tons per annum, and the major producer Natureworks LLC produces about 0.15 million tons via microbial fermentation with corn as a feedstock (Ögmundarson et al., 2020). Sustainable feedstock supply, high feedstock cost, and the food versus feed debate influence ongoing LA production, and economic feedstock with a low carbon footprint are desirable (Ma et al., 2021).
Macroalgae, commonly known as seaweeds, are emerging as a potential feedstock for LA fermentation. Macroalgae are multicellular photosynthetic organisms seen in marine habitats and are rich in carbohydrates (Kostas et al., 2021). Based on their pigment composition, macroalgae are classified as green algae – Chlorophyta, the red algae – Rhodophyta, and the brown algae – Phaeophyta. Green algae consist of chlorophyll, red algae consist of phycocyanin and phycoerythrin, and fucoxanthin is present in brown algae (Cesário et al., 2018). The advantages of seaweeds as a fermentation feedstock are as follows: (i) higher growth rate and areal productivity compared to terrestrial plants, (ii) high carbohydrate content of up to 70%, with fermentable sugars (iii) non-interference with the food industry, as seaweeds are primarily cultivated in off-shore or onshore systems in open seas, (iv) very low concentrations of lignin; the lignin content of green, red and brown macroalgae are 3.3, 1.8 and 7.3% respectively, while the lignin content of various lignocellulosic biomass is around 25–35%, (v) macroalgal sugars can attain a comparable LA yield of 0.16–0.17 g/g biomass, while for lignocellulosic feedstock LA yield is in the range of 0.18–0.19 g/g biomass, and (vi) high incidence of macroalgal blooms in oceans and beaching of green and macroalgal biomass is common, thus LA fermentation is a viable waste valorization strategy (Chung et al., 2021, Filote et al., 2021, Hwang et al., 2011, Kostas et al., 2021).
Red macroalgae are the highest produced algae compared to green and brown macroalgae. Red macroalgae and brown macroalgae account for 54.4% and 33.6%, respectively of the farmed seaweed, while green macroalgae account for only 0.08% (Radulovich et al., 2015). Green algae consist of ulvan, cellulose and starch as the major polysaccharides. Red algae have diverse polysaccharides, including agar, carrageenan, cellulose, floridean starch and floridoside. The major polysaccharides in brown algae are alginate, laminarin, and fucoidan. The distribution and structural characteristics of these polysaccharides vary with the macroalgal species (Thompson et al., 2019). Farmed red macroalgae are primarily used for the extraction of agar polysaccharides, and their applications as hydrocolloids. Thus, large-scale production and processing of red algae for polysaccharide extraction is an established industry. Brown macroalgae can perform light independent carbon fixation, which accounts for about 40% of the photosynthetic carbon assimilation, and higher productivity. Thus, the energy yield in brown macroalgae is in the order of ≥ 45%, while it is 30–35% in energy crops and 20–25% for lignocellulosic biomass (Song et al., 2015). Thus, brown macroalgae are an energetically favorable feedstock for conversion into valuable biochemicals.
In this study, three representative macroalgae from green, red and brown seaweeds namely Ulva sp., Gracilaria sp., and Sargassum cristaefolium were evaluated as a feedstock for LA fermentation. Acid-thermal hydrolysis was optimized for each feedstock with dilute sulfuric acid. The optimal lactobacilli for effective fermentation of each macroalgal hydrolysate were chosen by screening different lactobacilli.
Section snippets
Fermentative lactic acid bacteria
The lactic acid bacteria used in this study are Lactobacillus plantarum 23, Lactobacillus sakei 25, Lactobacillus rhamnosus, Weissella cibaria 27, Weissella sp. 28, and Weissella paramesenteroides 24. L. rhamnosus was a generous gift from Prof. Ng I-Son at National Cheng Kung University. All the other bacterial strains were maintained as laboratory stocks in 20% v/v glycerol at −80℃ in a deep freezer. All strains were cultured in the modified MRS medium at 30 °C, 200 rpm agitation, and under
Results and discussion
In the previous study, PVA immobilized L. plantarum was used for the fermentation of fermentable carbohydrates derived from microalga Chlorella vulgaris ESP-31. Continuous fermentation resulted in a LA yield of 0.99 g/g sugars consumed, along with 39.72 g/L LA and 9.93 g/L/h productivity (Chen et al., 2020). Recently, high LA productivity was demonstrated with macroalga Ulva sp. using immobilized L. plantarum 23. The yield was 0.91 g/g, with 36.8 g/L LA and 12.3 g/L/h productivity (Nagarajan et
Conclusions
Ulva sp., Gracilaria sp., and Sargassum cristaefolium can be effectively hydrolyzed by the acid-thermal method, with low sulfuric acid concentrations of ≤ 5%. The predominant sugars present in green, red and brown seaweeds were rhamnose, galactose and fucose, respectively. The fermentable monosaccharides released from the seaweeds were efficiently converted into LA by prevalent lactobacilli such as L. plantarum and L. rhamnosus. Consistent high lactate yields of ≥ 0.8 g/g sugars were obtained
CRediT authorship contribution statement
Dillirani Nagarajan: Investigation, Validation. Naomi Oktarina: Investigation, Data curation. Po-Ting Chen: Methodology, Resources. Chun-Yen Chen: Methodology, Resources. Duu-Jong Lee: Funding acquisition, Validation. Jo-Shu Chang: Conceptualization, Supervision, Project administration, Writing – review & editing.
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.
Acknowledgments
The authors acknowledge the financial support received from Taiwan’s Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST) under grant number 110-3116-F-006 -003, 110-2221-E-029 -004 -MY3, 110-2621-M-029 -001, and 109-2622-E-110 -011.
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