(513a) A Novel Spouted Bed Bioreactor for Solid State Fermentation of Value Added Chemicals and Enzymes

The bioprocessing industry has sought efficient bioreactor systems capable of utilizing low value commodities or byproducts from the U.S. agricultural industry for the production of food ingredients, chemicals, and biologically active compounds. Solid State Fermentation (SSF) is capable of employing abundant, low-cost biomaterials with little or no pretreatment to efficiently produce high valued products. SSF has unique process characteristics that provide advantages over submerged culture fermentation. There is little or no free water in the fermentation system allowing for high volumetric product concentration and easy downstream processing. The major challenge to SSF is difficulty in solids handling and hold up due to aggregate formation from mycelial caking. A gas-solid spouted bed bioreactor (SBB) for SFF is proposed. The SBB is capable of preventing agglomeration of particles because high speed impacts occur in the core region of the spouted bed. It is also capable of handling the large coarse particles which are to be used as substrates for the SSF process. Additionally, the spouted bed bioreactor provides exceptional mixing which is advantageous for mass and heat transfer. The efficacy of solid state fermentation to produce important enzymes and industrial chemicals will be demonstrated by fermentation of Trichoderma reesei to produce cellulase. The fermentation conditions will then be optimized with respect to substrate, initial moisture content, temperature, fermentation time, inorganic salt concentration and surfactant concentration. After optimal conditions are ascertained, growth kinetics will be determined for use in a mathematical model which will simulate the spouted bed bioreactor. The model will be validated through experimentation and used to design a pilot scale reactor.