Production of lipase from Geotrichum sp and adsorption studies on affinityresin

There is a growing interest in microbial lipase production due to its great potential for industrial applications such as food additives, industrial r eagents and stain removers, as wall as for medical applications. Specially for medical applications a high degree of purity is required, which is acco mplished with high resolution chromatographic techniques. Affinity chromato graphy is considered a very high resolution chromatographic technique. In t his work the adsorption isotherms and kinetics of the adsorption of lipase from Geotrichum sp on biospecific resin were determined. The resin was prep ared using EAH sepharose 4B gel (Pharmacia), made to react with oleic acid as the specific ligand. The lipase was produced in a five-liter fermenter, with both complex and synthetic media. Fermentation conditions were a tempe rature of 30 degrees C, an aeration of IVVM and an agitation of 400 rpm. Ma ximum lipase activity was around 28 U/ml after 10 hours of fermentation for the complex medium. The kinetic model and parameters were determined by dy namic fitting to experimental results using the fourth-order Runge-Kutta me thod.