Fed-batch Fermentation for Pleuromutilin Production by Pleurotus mutilis

The effects of carbon source (i.e. glucose concentration) on cell growth and production and productivity of pleuromutilin were investigated. A relatively higher initial glucose concentration could improve the production of pleuromutilin but will decrease the productivity of pleuromutilin in shake flask. Different fed-batch strategies including constant feed rate fed-batch, exponential fed-batch, constant glucose concentration fed-batch and pH control fed-batch were further compared with batch fermentation in 7 l fermentor. Constant glucose concentration fed-batch was an effective method for simultaneously enhancing the production and productivity of pleuromutilin that reached 4.99 g/l and 0.026 g/l per hour at 192 h which was 55.9 % and 100 % higher than that in batch fermentation. The fed-batch method was successfully scaled up in 50 l fermentor which the production and productivity of pleuromutilin were 10.15 g/l and 0.053 g/l per hour at 192 h. This work is helpful for the large-scale production of pleuramutilin.