Comparative study of production of Bio-Indigo by Pandoraea sp. in a two phase - fed batch and continuous bioreactor

Abstract

Indigo, is blue of blue jeans, a synthetic dye used on large scale all over the world. Chemical production of the dye is taking a new route towards bacterial production to overcome the environmental effects that are posed by the synthetic blue powder (Indigo). In the present work a strain Pandoraea sp. isolated from the oil contaminated soil is found to produce blue pigment which is analyzed qualitatively as indigo using UV-visible scan and Thin Layer Chromatography (TLC). The strain is used for indigo production at lab scale in two different bioreactor configurations first the fed batch mode and second continuous mode using two phases. The two phases consisting of medium carrying biomass and the second phase of silicone oil carrying substrate indole. The use of second phase allows higher concentration of substrate injection reducing the inhibition effects of the substrate as well as act as a partitioning agent for removal of the product. In two phase study, the maximum indigo produced was seen to be 0.068 g/L after 22 hours of substrate injection into the Fermentor in a fed batch mode. The maximum yield obtained in this configuration was 19%. For commercial production of bio-indigo a continuous operation is required, which was studied in a bioreactor with 2.5 liter capacity under the optimized conditions. The maximum indigo produced was found to be 0.052 g/L after about 72 hours of operation. The results showed decrease in the production of indigo in continuous mode as compared to fed batch operation, which may be due to the insufficient time available for the bacteria to bio-transform indole into indigo