Abstract
A new strain of Serratia marcescens UCP1459 isolated from a semi-arid soil produced the natural red pigment prodigiosin, characterized by an uncommon pyrrolylpyrromethane skeleton. Prodigiosin is a promising drug due to its reported antifungal, immunosuppressive and anti-proliferative activities. The objective of this work was to indentify a suitable medium to simultaneously enhance S. marcescens growth and pigment production using renewable resources obtained from industrial wastes. S. marcescens produced the highest level of prodigiosin (49.5 g/L) at 48 h of cultivation using 6% “manipueira” (cassava wastewater) supplemented with mannitol (2%) at pH 7 and 28 °C. Carbohydrates in “manipueira” and mannitol play a role in the enhanced cell growth and prodigiosin production. The purified pigment extracted from the biomass was analyzed by mass spectrophotometry and showed the expected molecular weight of 324 Da corresponding to prodigiosin. In conclusion, we have successfully designed a new, economically feasible medium supporting enhanced S. marcescens growth and a high yield production of prodigiosin.
Highlights
Prodigiosin (5[(3-methoxy-5-pyrrol-2-ylidene-pyrrol-2-ylidene)-methyl]-2-methyl-3-pentyl-1Hpyrrole) is a secondary metabolite alkaloid with a unique tripyrrole chemical structure
In the present study we investigated the influence of agroindustrial cassava liquid waste and corn steep liquor with or without mannitol supplementation as a low-cost medium for S. marcescens growth and effective production of prodigiosin
S. marcescens produced a higher amount of biomass in this medium, but the results clearly showed that this did not significantly enhance pigment production and the addition of corn steep liquor caused a reduction in prodigiosin production which could be due to catabolite repression
Summary
Prodigiosin (5[(3-methoxy-5-pyrrol-2-ylidene-pyrrol-2-ylidene)-methyl]-2-methyl-3-pentyl-1Hpyrrole) is a secondary metabolite alkaloid with a unique tripyrrole chemical structure. In the present study we investigated the influence of agroindustrial cassava liquid waste and corn steep liquor with or without mannitol supplementation as a low-cost medium for S. marcescens growth and effective production of prodigiosin. Prodigiosin production by S. marcescens UCP 1549 was compared for six culture media (Table 1 and Figure 2).
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