@masterthesis{Koesters, type = {Bachelor Thesis}, author = {K{\"o}sters, Dominic}, title = {Production and Chromatographic Analysis of Polyhydroxybutyrate from waste product streams by Azohydromonas lata}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:hbz:1383-opus4-4246}, school = {Hochschule Rhein-Waal}, pages = {69}, abstract = {As conventional plastic production receives much criticism for being harmful to both humans and the environment, this work focused on establishing a batch fermentation based on waste substrates from local industries to produce polyhydroxybutyrate (PHB) with Azohydromonas lata (A. lata). Additionally, the produced PHB was characterised by qualitative and quantitative gas chromatography coupled to a mass spectrometer (GC-MS) and gel permeation chromatography (GPC). Multiple substrates, including rhubarb waste, pea waste, and dairy industry wastewater (KAAS medium), were tested for successful fermentation. Rhubarb and pea waste could not be used as a fermentation substrate due to obstacles in upstream processing. KAAS medium was prepared by centrifugation and sterile filtration and tested in a 1 L and 4 L fermentation yielding non-competitive biomass and PHB concentrations with 0.09 g/L and 0.004 g/L, respectively. A 3 L fermentation with pure saccharose as the carbon source served as a model for comparison and analysis and resulted in a measured biomass concentration of 3.58 g/L with a PHB content of 1.43 g/L after Soxhlet extraction. The GPC analysis led to no conclusive elograms and results due to issues in non-destructively extracting and solving the PHB. The GC-MS analysis showed excellent linearity with an R2 value of 0.9906 for the standard curve and clear chromatograms, which allowed for both qualitative and quantitative analysis of PHB. Since PHB concentrations from KAAS medium were low, no quantitative analysis could be performed. Only samples from the saccharose-based fermentation could be assessed quantitatively. The found maximum PHB concentration was 2.95 g/L, which deviated from the found 1.43 g/L after Soxhlet extraction and was therefore discussed in this work. No locally available waste substrate could be found to be suitable for an industrial scale fermentation. The findings during this work led to the conclusion that semi-sterile fermentation approaches shall be investigated in future works handling waste products as they can potentially overcome upstream processing steps and, hence, make rhubarb or pea waste a potential candidate for PHB production.}, language = {en} }