Industrial-scale fermentation bioreactor design

Dark fermentation presents many advantages with respect to photo-fermentation. Reactor design is not affected by light supply thus, dark bioreactors exploit volume more efficiendy, and oxygen removal is no more a problem when the anaerobic conditions are chosen. Consequendy, dark bioreactors are the main focus of research to develop a reliable, industrial-scale system to produce biohydrogen (Levin, Pitt, Love, 2004). 

Stirred-tank bioreactors are widely used in the modern biotechnological industry. Most products produced from animal cells on a large scale worldwide are manufactured in this type of bioreactor. In general, these reactors are very similar to fermenters used in industrial submerged culture of microorganisms, and are simple to design, having the shape of a tank and impellers to promote mixture of the contents. 

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