Enhanced Bioconversion of Methane to Biodiesel by Methylosarcina sp. LC-4

Nivedita Sana, Dali Naidu Arnepalli () and Chandraraj Krishnan
Additional contact information
Nivedita Sana: Department of Civil Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Madras, Chennai 600036, India
Dali Naidu Arnepalli: Department of Civil Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Madras, Chennai 600036, India
Chandraraj Krishnan: Department of Biotechnology, Indian Institute of Technology Madras, Chennai 600036, India

Sustainability, 2022, vol. 15, issue 1, 1-15

Abstract: The conversion of methane into liquid biofuels using methane-consuming bacteria, known as methanotrophs, contributes to sustainable development, as it mitigates the problem of climate change caused by greenhouse gases and aids in producing cleaner and renewable energy. In the present research, an efficient methanotroph, Methylosarcina sp. LC-4, was studied as a prospective organism for biodiesel production using methane. The methane uptake rate by the organism was enhanced 1.6 times and 2.35 times by supplementing LC-4 with micronutrients, such as copper and tungstate, respectively. This unique ability of the isolated organism enables the deployment of methanotrophs-based processes in various industrial applications. A Plackett–Burman statistical (PBD) design was used to quantify the role of the micronutrients and other media components present in the nitrate minimal salt media (NMS) in biomass and fatty acid methyl esters (FAME) yields. Nitrate, phosphate, and tungstate had a positive effect, whereas copper, magnesium, and salinity had a negative effect. The modified NMS media, formulated according to the results from the PBD analysis, increased the FAME yield (mg/L) by 85.7%, with the FAME content of 13 ± 1% ( w / w ) among the highest reported in methanotrophs. The obtained FAME consisted majorly (~90%) of C 14 –C 18 saturated and monounsaturated fatty acids, making it suitable for use as biodiesel.

Keywords: biodiesel; biological gas to liquid; methanotroph (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/15/1/505/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/15/1/505/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:15:y:2022:i:1:p:505-:d:1017604

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().