Abstract
Exopolysacharides (EPS) produced by Lactobacillus acidophilus play an important role in food processing with its well-recognized antioxidant activity. In this study, a L. acidophilus mutant strain with high-yielding EPS (2.92±0.05 g/L) was screened by chemical mutation (0.2 % diethyl sulfate). Plackett-Burman (PB) design and response surface methodology (RSM) were applied to optimize the EPS fermentation parameters and central composite design (CCD) was used to optimize the EPS extraction parameters. A strain with high-yielding EPS was screened. It was revealed that three parameters (Tween 80, dipotassium hydrogen phosphate and trisodium citrate) had significant influence (P < 0.05) on the EPS yield. The optimal culture conditions for EPS production were: Tween 80 0.6 mL, dipotassium hydrogen phosphate 3.6 g and trisodium citrate 4.1 g (with culture volume of 1 L). In these conditions, the maximum EPS yield was 3.96±0.08 g/L. The optimal extraction conditions analyzed by CCD were: alcohol concentration 70 %, the ratio of material to liquid (M/L ratio) 1:3.6 and the extraction time 31 h. In these conditions, the maximum EPS extraction yield was 1.48±0.23 g/L. It was confirmed by the verification experiments that the EPS yield from L. acidophilus mutant strains reached 5.12±0.73 g/L under the optimized fermentation and extraction conditions, which was 3.8 times higher than that of the control (1.05±0.06 g/L). The results indicated that the strain screening with high-yielding EPS was successful and the optimized fermentation and extraction conditions significantly enhanced EPS yield. It was efficient and industrially promising.