Mechanistic understanding of mixed-culture fermentations by metabolic modelling

  1. Regueira López, Alberte
Supervised by:
  1. Juan Manuel Lema Rodicio Director
  2. Miguel Mauricio Iglesias Director

Defence university: Universidade de Santiago de Compostela

Fecha de defensa: 26 June 2020

Committee:
  1. Jean Philippe Steyer Chair
  2. Eva Balsa-Canto Secretary
  3. Korneel Rabaey Committee member
Department:
  1. Department of Chemical Engineering

Type: Thesis

Abstract

Biorefineries are set to become an important agent in the shift towards a circular economy due to their potential to valorise organic wastes into marketable products. Anaerobic fermentations yielding volatile fatty acids are a key process in this production scheme as their products act as intermediates between the organic wastes and the final biorefinery products. However, their product selectivity is highly influenced by the environmental conditions and the mechanisms governing the process remain unknown. In this thesis, predictive tools were developed with the objective of understanding the mechanisms governing anaerobic fermentations and of designing processes targeting specific volatile fatty acids with high productivity.