No abstract

The activity of bacterial strains significantly influences the quality and the taste of vinegar. Previous studies of acetic acid bacteria have primarily focused on the ability of bacterial strains to produce high amounts of acetic acid. However, few studies have examined the production of gluconic acid during acetous fermentation at high temperatures. The production of vinegar at high temperatures by two strains of acetic acid bacteria isolated from apple and cactus fruits, namely AF01 and CV01, respectively, was evaluated in this study. The simultaneous production of gluconic and acetic acids was also examined in this study. Biochemical and molecular identification based on a 16s rDNA sequence analysis confirmed that these strains can be classified as Acetobacter pasteurianus. To assess the ability of the isolated strains to grow and produce acetic acid and gluconic acid at high temperatures, a semi-continuous fermentation was performed in a 20-L bioreactor. The two strains abundantly grew at a high temperature (41 C). At the end of the fermentation, the AF01 and CV01 strains yielded acetic acid concentrations of 7.64% (w/v) and 10.08% (w/v), respectively. Interestingly, CV01 was able to simultaneously produce acetic and gluconic acids during acetic fermentation, whereas AF01 mainly produced acetic acid. In addition, CV01 was less sensitive to ethanol depletion during semi-continuous fermentation. Finally, the enzymatic study showed that the two strains exhibited high ADH and ALDH enzyme activity at 38 C compared with the mesophilic reference strain LMG 1632, which was significantly susceptible to thermal inactivation.

Downstream processes have great influences on bacterial starter production. Different modifications occur to cellular compounds during freeze-drying process and storage of bacterial starters. Consequently, viability and culturability (multiplication capacity) undergo some changes. In this study, the effects of freeze-drying process and storage conditions were examined on cell envelope integrity, respiration and culturability of <em>Acetobacter senegalensis</em>. Freezing of cells protected with mannitol (20% w/w) did not affect cell multiplication and respiration considerably; however, 19% of cells showed compromised cell envelope after freezing. After drying, 1.96&times;10¹¹ CFU/g were enumerated, indicating that about 34% of the cells could survive and keep their culturability. Drying of the cells induced further leakage in cell envelope and finally 81% of cells appeared as injured ones; however, 87% of the dried cells maintained their respiration capacity. Storage temperature had significant effect on cell multiplication ability; higher storage temperature (35&deg;C) caused 8.59-log reduction in cell culturability after nine-month period of storage. Collapse of cell envelop integrity and respiration was observed at 35&deg;C. At lower storage temperature (4&deg;C), the culturability decreased about one-log reduction after nine months. Cell envelope integrity was subjected to minor changes during a period of nine month-storage at 4&deg;C whereas a heterogeneous population of cells with different respiration capacity emerged at 4&deg;C. These results indicate that a major part of cells undergone drying process and storage entered into viable but non-culturable state. In addition, usage of different culture media didn&rsquo;t improve resuscitation. Besides, it seems that sub-lethal damages to cell envelope caused uptake of propidium iodide, however these kinds of injuries could not impress cell multiplications and respiration.