Anaerobic Fermentation

Anaerobic fermentation has a wide range of applications in pharmaceuticals, food, cosmetics, nutraceuticals, industrial biotechnology, and other fields. At BOC Sciences, we develop fermentation technology and provide one-stop fermentation services. With over 20 years of experience in strain breeding, we have built an excellent strain development platform whose microorganisms cover both prokaryotic and eukaryotic systems. BOC Sciences is able to produce a variety of biologically active products by using these strain systems as host cells for fermentation, including but not limited to:

• Escherichia coli
• Bacillus subtilis
• Streptomyces
• Pichia pastoris
• Saccharomyces
• Penicillium

As a leading CDMO with expertise and advanced technology in anaerobic fermentation, BOC Sciences offers fermentation services from laboratory scale to commercial scale. We can develop, produce and manufacture a wide range of biologically active compounds, such as:

• Proteins
• Modified Peptides
• Carbohydrates
• Oligonucleotides
• Antibiotics
• Mycotoxins

BOC Sciences provides customized fermentation services based on the individual needs of our clients. We are committed to helping our clients accelerate their projects in all aspects of the process. Our fermentation CDMO services include:

• Strain Development Service
• Fermentation Process Optimization
• Scale-Up Fermentation Service
• Microbial GM P Production
• GRAS Services

Introduction of Anaerobic Fermentation

Anaerobic fermentation, which is a common respiration process in all bacteria and eukaryotes, is a metabolic pathway that converts carbohydrates into organic acids, gases, or alcohols under anaerobic conditions. Anaerobic fermentation causes NADH to react with endogenous organic electron acceptors, extracting energy from the molecule and producing NAD+ and an organic product, such as ethanol, lactic acid, butyric acid, acetone, hydrogen, carbon dioxide, etc. 
Fermentation normally occurs in an anaerobic environment. Microorganisms are engineered as cellular factories capable of efficiently manufacturing proteins, enzymes, flavor molecules, vitamins, pigments, and fats. In anaerobic fermentation, microorganisms overproduce valuable biological products such as secondary metabolites. It usually involves metabolic engineering to induce the production of certain metabolites by manipulating relevant metabolic genes of microorganisms.

Methods of Anaerobic Fermentation

There are three main fermentation methods: batch, fed-batch, and continuous fermentation.

• Batch fermentation: By using closed vessels, all required mediums are added at the beginning of the fermentation process in order to maximize the production of microbial biomass as well as related metabolites.
• Fed-batch fermentation: Fresh mediums are added during strain culture to prevent nutrient depletion as a limiting factor for microbial metabolite production. The fed-batch process is a partly open system that controls the productivity of microorganisms using different feeding strategies.
• Continuous fermentation: This method is commonly used with industrial-scale production. The exponential period of microorganisms is extended by adding fresh nutrients to microbial cells and removing cells from the bioreactor at a specific rate and time. The three most common types of continuous culture are chemostat, turbidostat, and perfusion culture.

Applications of Anaerobic Fermentation

Traditionally, anaerobic fermentation has been used with food and production, including the preservation of consumables and the production of alcoholic beverages. Today, anaerobic fermentation has expanded its applications far beyond traditional uses. In recent industrial fermentation, microorganisms and eukaryotic cells are engineered for the production of fermented goods for our use.

• Fermented extracellular metabolites: Some commodity chemicals include primary metabolites (e.g., acetic acid, citric acid, amino acid, ethanol, vitamins, polysaccharides) and secondary metabolites (e.g., alkaloids, glucoside, bacteriocin, lovastatin).
• Fermented intracellular components: Production of recombinant proteins and intracellular enzymes (e.g., amylase, protease, cellulase ).
• Biotransformation: Traditional food fermentation, ethanol fuel, sewage treatment, and agricultural feed.