Cellulase enzyme production from rice bran by Aspergillus niger

Abstract

Cellulases are a group of hydrolytic enzymes that have potential application in different field of natural sciences and high commercial values in various industries such as textile, food, beverages, paper and pulp industries. This project aims to study the optimum operating parameters with the most suitable carbon and nitrogen sources for cellulase production. In this study, the cellulase production produced by Aspergillus niger under solid state fermentation was studied using rice bran as the substrates. Central composite design (CCD) method was selected in Design Experts software to study the interaction between three parameters which were incubation time (6 days – 8 days), moisture content (60% - 80%) and inoculum size (5% - 15%). One-Factor-at-A-Time (OFAT) method was subsequently used to obtain the most suitable carbon and nitrogen sources for cellulase production. From this research, it is found that the most optimum solid state fermentation condition to produce cellulase were at 10% inoculum size, 7 days of incubation time and 70% moisture content with the cellulase activity of 0.375 U/mL. Glucose and ammonium sulfate were chosen as the most suitable carbon and nitrogen sources for cellulase enzyme production with the highest cellulase activity produced was 0.300 U/mL.