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Biological hydrogen production from nitrogen‐deficient substrates
Author(s) -
Hafner Sasha D.
Publication year - 2006
Publication title -
biotechnology and bioengineering
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.136
H-Index - 189
eISSN - 1097-0290
pISSN - 0006-3592
DOI - 10.1002/bit.21279
Subject(s) - bioconversion , dark fermentation , fermentation , biomass (ecology) , chemistry , effluent , fermentative hydrogen production , nitrogen , pulp and paper industry , food science , biohydrogen , microbiology and biotechnology , hydrogen production , hydrogen , environmental science , biology , organic chemistry , environmental engineering , ecology , engineering
Dark fermentation of biomass using mixed bacterial cultures is one approach to producing renewable H 2 . The objective of this work was to determine if this approach could be applied to N‐deficient feedstocks using an N 2 ‐fixing mixed culture. A mixed culture produced up to 240 mL H 2 /g glucose (1.9 mol H 2 /mol glucose) from a medium initially lacking combined N. Yields from sugarcane were also promising: 170 mL H 2 /g volatile solids (7.5 mmol H 2 /g volatile solids). This approach could reduce economic and environmental costs of fermentative H 2 production, provide combined N for subsequent bioconversion stages, and improve effluent suitability for subsequent uses. Biotechnol. Bioeng. 2007;97: 435–437. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.