earticle

영어

Marine biomass including macroalgae has been evaluated as the third generation biomass for biorefinery. However, biological conversion of brown seaweed has been limited by lack of feasible microorganisms which can transform structured alginate from kelp into biochemicals. As a proprietary technology for conversion of seaweed to ethanol, the consolidated bioprocessing (CBP) has been being developed to avoid the needs for expensive enzymes or chemical pretreatment of biomass. For this purpose, from Laminaria japonica with thallus shedding, alginatedegrading microorganisms were isolated, which can utilize alginate as a sole carbon source for their growth and ethanol production. Based on the biochemical characteristics, we categorized candidate isolates into 3 groups: i) isolates with high saccharolytic activity against alginate; ii) isolates producing succinic acid; and iii) isolates producing ethanol directly from alginate. Each isolate is identified by 16S rRNA sequence analysis and evaluated the compatibility as a strain for CBP of L. japonica. Also, batch and continuous processes are operated for targeted production of ethanol or succinic acid with high selectivity and high yield as well.