Monitoring of Organic Acids in Biomass Fermentation Process and Yeast Cultivation Process

User Benefits

- Enables selective, high sensitivity analysis of organic acids in biomass fermentation samples, which contain many contaminants. - Multiple organic acids such as lactic acid, formic acid, and acetic acid can be separated in a short time with high efficiency, supporting quick determination of the condition of fermentation. - Contributes to improvement of work efficiency in research and development of biofuels, and particularly second-generation biofuels.

Introduction

Bioethanol is a form of carbon-neutral renewable energy and is an object of worldwide research as a measure for preventing global warming and an alternative for petroleum fuels. Due to fears for the shortage and the price increase of the food crops, development of second-generation biofuels is underway utilizing cellulose or hemicellulose from nonfood plants such as wood and rice straw. However, the production of the second-generation biofuel requires numerous processes for decomposition and fermentation of fibrous substances. A generation of organic acids such as acetic acid in those processes inhibits fermentation and thus has a large impact on the ethanol yield formed in the process. For this reason, a monitoring the behavior of organic acids during fermentation is an extremely important issue for controlling the ethanol yield. In this article, the time-dependent variations in concentrations of organic acids in biomass fermentation samples and a yeast culture solution were monitored using the Nexera organic acid analysis system. In the post-column pH buffering-electric conductivity detection method used in this system, it is possible to detect organic acids with high sensitivity and good selectivity by mixing with a pH buffering reagent after column separation. This is the optimum system for the analysis of samples such as biomass fermentation solutions that contain many contaminants. In the experiments described here, the Nexera organic acid analysis system in combination with the Shimpack™ Fast-OA columns for high speed analysis provided a 50% shortened analysis time and a quick checking for problems in the fermentation process.

February 28, 2021 GMT