Production of lipopeptide biosurfactant in batch and fed-batch Streptomyces sp. PBD-410L cultures growing on palm oil

The present study focused on lipopeptide biosurfactant production by Streptomyces sp. PBD-410L in batch and fed-batch fermentation in a 3-L stirred-tank reactor (STR) using palm oil as a sole carbon source. In batch cultivation, the impact of bioprocessing parameters, namely aeration rate and agitation speed, was studied to improve biomass growth and lipopeptide biosurfactant production. The maximum oil spreading technique (OST) result (45 mm) which corresponds to 3.74 g/L of biosurfactant produced, was attained when the culture was agitated at 200 rpm and aeration rate of 0.5 vvm. The best aeration rate and agitation speed obtained from the batch cultivation was adopted in the fed-batch cultivation using DO-stat feeding strategy to further improve the lipopeptide biosurfactant production. The lipopeptide biosurfactant production was enhanced from 3.74 to 5.32 g/L via fed-batch fermentation mode at an initial feed rate of 0.6 mL/h compared to that in batch cultivation. This is the first report on the employment of fed-batch cultivation on the production of biosurfactant by genus Streptomyces.