Wautersia eutropha

PHA is produced by different bacterial strains. One of the most studied strain is C. necator (formerly known as Wautersia eutropha, Ralstonia eutropha or Alcaligene eutrophus). It was used in industrial production by Imperial Chemical Industries (ICI PLC) to produce P(3HB-co-3HV) under the trade name of BiopoF. The Biopol patents have now been acquired by Metabolix Inc. (USA) (Verlinden et al. 2007). Until now, C. necator is still being used widely for bacterial fermentation as it is an efficient strain. Other important strains that have been studied for PHA production are Bacillus spp., Alcaligenes spp.. Pseudomonas spp., Aeromonas hydrophila, Rhodopseudomonas palustris, recombinant Escherichia coli, Burkholderia sacchari, and Halomonas boliviensis (Verlinden et al. 2007). 

Liu JH, Jen HL, Chung YC (1999) Surface modification of polyethylene membrans using phos-phorylcholine derivatives and their platelet compatibility. J Appl Polym Sci 74 2947-2954 Loh SK, ChooYM, Cheng SF, Ma A (2006) Recovery and conversion of palm olein-derived used frying oil to methyl esters for biodiesel. J Oil Palm Res 18 247-252 Loo C-Y, Lee W-H, Tsuge T, Doi Y, Sudesh K (2005) Biosynthesis and characterization of poly(3-hydroxybutyrate-co-3-hydroxyhexanoate) from pahn oQ products in a Wautersia eutropha mutant. Biotechnol Lett 27 1405-1410... 

For the bacterial production of PHAs by wild-type strains, the Ralstonia eutropha (formerly called Alcaligenes eutrophus, Wautersia eutropha, or Cupri-avidus necator) has been the most commonly used wild-type strain for the industrial production of PHB, P3HB4HB, and PHBV. 

Kharma and Srivastava reported members of the genus Wautersia uptake excessive carbon from the medium and accumulate PHB. Continuous cultivation of Wautersia eutropha was carried out in a 7L reactor. Reaaor was operated in a batch mode for initial 15 h followed by a fed-batch mode for sufficient biomass and PHB production, followed by a continuous mode so that PHB production was continuously maintained and released from the reactor. 

Khanna S, Srivastava AK. Continuous cultivation of Wautersia eutropha for the production of a biodegradable polymer poly-P-hydroxybutyrate. AsPacJ Mol Biol Biotechnol 2010 18 31-3. 

The bacterium capable of performing this feat was Wautersia eutropha, and the conamercial polyester was trade named Biopol , now produced by MetaboUx, Inc. (28). Biopol is a copolyester containing randomly arranged mers of i -3-hydroxybutyrate, HB, and / -3-hydroxyvaIerate, HV ... 

Intracellular PHB Depolymerase of Cupriavidus necator. Note that C. necator was previously known as Ralstonia eutropha, Wautersia eutropha, Alcaligenes eutropha and Hydrogenomonas eutropha. iPHB depolymerases of PHAscl-accumulating bacteria were not described before the year 2000 but since then not less than seven putative iPHB depolymerases and two 3-hydroxybutyrate oligomer hydrolases have been postulated for C. 

Extensive work was conducted for microbial production of PHB and PHBV. Accumulated experience has led to the industrial production of PHB by Chemie Linz AG/Austria in the 1980s, using the bacterial stiaia Alcaligenes latus. However, the poor mechanical properties and weak processibility limited development of PHB as an environmentally friendly packaging material. PHBV was subsequently developed by Zeneca/UK (then ICI or Imperial Chemical Industries Co. Ltd), using Wautersia eutropha as a production strain. PHBV had improved properties over PHB (Table 2.1) and ICI developed PHBV with the Trade name of BIOPOL. 

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