Background: The effect of diverse oxygen transfer coefficient on the l-erythrulose production from meso-erythritol by a newly isolated strain, Gluconobacter kondonii CGMCC8391 was investigated. In order to elucidate the effects of volumetric mass transfer coefficient ( k L a) on the fermentations, baffled and unbaffled flask cultures, and fed-batch cultures were developed in present work. Results: With the increase of the k L a value in the fed-batch culture, l-erythrulose concentration, productivity and yield were significantly improved, while cell growth was not the best in the high k L a. Thus, a two-stage oxygen supply control strategy was proposed, aimed at achieving high concentration and high productivity of l-erythrulose. During the first 12 h, k L a was controlled at 40.28 h -1 to obtain high value for cell growth, subsequently k L a was controlled at 86.31 h -1 to allow for high l-erythrulose accumulation. Conclusions: Under optimal conditions, the l-erythrulose concentration, productivity, yield and DCW reached 207.9 ± 7.78 g/L, 6.50 g/L/h, 0.94 g/g, 2.68 ± 0.17 g/L, respectively. At the end of fermentation, the l-erythrulose concentration and productivity were higher than those in the previous similar reports. Normal 0 21 false false false FR X-NONE X-NONE /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:Tabla normal; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-parent:; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; text-align:justify; text-justify:inter-ideograph; line-height:200%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:Times New Roman,serif; mso-ansi-language:EN-US; mso-fareast-language:JA;}