Clostridium acetobutylicum: Difference between revisions

Clostridium acetobutylicum
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Bacteria
Division:	Firmicutes
Class:	Clostridia
Order:	Clostridiale
Family:	Clostridiaceae
Genus:	Clostridium
Species:	C. acetobutylicum

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Clostridium acetobutylicum, included in the genus Clostridium, is a commercially valuable bacterium sometimes called the "Weizmann Organism", after Jewish-Russian born Chaim Weizmann, then senior lecturer at the University of Manchester, England, used them in 1916 as a bio-chemical tool to produce at the same time, jointly, acetone, ethanol and butanol from starch. The method was described since as the ABE process, (Acetone Butanol Ethanol fermentation process), yielding 3 parts of acetone, 6 of butanol and 1 of ethanol, reducing the former difficulties to make cordite, an explosive, from acetone and paving the way also, for instance, to obtain vehicle fuels and synthetic rubber, based amongst others on the pioneering work of Polish Russian Sergei Vasiljevich Lebedev (1874–1934) using butanol polymerized with metallic sodium during the World War II for vehicles tyres with natural rubber imports from Malaysia and Brazil blocked by the British.

Another Russian-American scientist , Ivan Ostromislensky, (1880–1939), is credited with work , circa 1910 - 1913, on synthetic rubber at Moscow State University and at Bogatyr, Russia. he was a traveler, entreprener and fine researcher at Zurich, including chemotherapy drugs for syphilis, such as Salvarsan, in the 1910s who emigrated in 1921, from the University of Latvia, Riga, by then an country independent of the former Russian Empire, to the U. S. A. invited to work from May 1922 by Dr.A. Hopkinson at the Labs of the United States Rubber Company and Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company, and setting up his own pharmaceutical drugs labs in the USA.

Ostromislensky's work in the 1930s, as a new American citizen, for Union Carbide Corporation is today recognized as important for the U.S. military effort during World War II, including those reactions whereby ethanol is oxidized to acetaldehyde, which reacts with additional ethanol over a tantalum-promoted porous silica catalyst at 325–350 °C to yield butadiene.

The A.B.E. process was an industry standard until the late 1940s, some factories having been set up meanwhile by Joseph Stalin advisers at some of the SSSR Central Asia republics now independent from the actual Russian Federation, manufacturing some 50,000 Tons/year, but low oil costs till 1973 drove after the seventies to so called more-efficient processes based on hydrocarbon cracking and petroleum distillation techniques.

Increases in world population and higher life expectancies for many hundreds of millions of emerging countries, coupled with outstanding progress in the bio-technological field, opens once again the question of whether or not (or to what extent) A.B.E.-like processes could be important for the future.

Other types of clostridium bacteria

Clostridium consists of around 100 species that include common free-living bacteria as well as important pathogens. There are four main species responsible for disease in humans: C. botulinum, an organism that produces botulinum toxin in food/wound and can cause botulism. Honey sometimes contains spores of Clostridium botulinum, which may cause infant botulism in humans one year old and younger. The toxin eventually paralyzes the infant's breathing muscles. Adults and older children can eat honey safely, because Clostridia do not compete well with the other rapidly growing bacteria present in the GI (Gastrointestinal) tract. This same toxin is known as "Botox" and is used cosmetically to paralyze facial muscles to reduce the signs of aging; it also has numerous therapeutic uses. C. difficile, which can flourish when other bacteria in the gut are killed during antibiotic therapy, leading to pseudomembranous colitis (a cause of antibiotic-associated diarrhea). C. perfringens, formerly called C. welchii, causes a wide range of symptoms, from food poisoning to gas gangrene. Also responsible for enterotoxemia (also known as "overeating disease" or "pulpy kidney disease") in sheep and goats. C. perfringens also takes the place of yeast in the making of salt rising bread. The name perfringens means "breaking through, breaking in pieces". C. tetani, the causative organism of tetanus. The name derives from "of a tension", referring to the tension (caused by tetanus) in the muscles.[citation needed] C. sordellii has been linked to the deaths of more than a dozen women after childbirth.[citation needed]Fatal Clostridium sordellii infections after medical abortions.Meites E, Zane S, Gould C; N Engl J Med. 2010 Sep 30;363(14):1382-3.

Unlike yeast, which can digest sugar only into alcohol and carbon dioxide, C. acetobutylicum and other Clostridia can digest whey, sugar, starch, perhaps certain types of lignin yielding butanol, propionic acid, ether, and glycerin. Apart from the need for temperature control, the A.B.E. synthesis process is relatively simple. The products are however, completely miscible in water at the low concentrations produced by fermentation. In addition there is an azeotrope formed by both ethanol and water as well as Butanol and water. The azeotropes as well as the low concentrations of product lead to a relatively complicated separations process.

Some genetic engineering manipulations

James Liao, a chemical engineer at the University of California, Los Angeles, developed a method to insert genes from Clostridium acetobutylicum which are responsible for production of butanol into the bacterium Escherichia coli. [1] [2]

References

http://www.encyclopedia.com/topic/Chaim_Weizmann.aspx
D.T. Jones , D. R. Woods , Acetone-butanol fermentation revisited. Microbiol Rev. 1986 December; 50(4): 484–524. PMCID: PMC373084.pages 484 - 524.
Ronald M. Atlas, Richard Barta, Microbial Ecology, Fundamentals and Applications, Benjamin/Cummings Publishing Co. Inc., Redwood City, CA, 3rd edition, 563 pages.ISBN 0-8053-0653-6
Microbial Processes: Promising Technologies for Developing Countries, National Academy of Sciences, Washington, (1979).

See,Internet: http://www.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=9544&page=R1. Probably, you can see, for immediate results, (consulted May 2011): 27 hits 6 Fuel and Energy 107-123 42 hits 7 Waste Treatment and Utilization 124-141 36 hits 8 Cellulose Conversion 142-157

http://peswiki.com/index.php/Directory:Butanol
http://www.greencarcongress.com/2008/01/biofuel-centre.html, News from 31 January 2008.
Kirshenbaum, I. (1978). Butadiene. In M. Grayson (Ed.), Encyclopedia of Chemical Technology, 3rd ed., vol. 4, pp. 313–337. New York: John Wiley & Sons.
http://english.turkcebilgi.com/Biobutanol
UCLA researchers engineer E. coli to produce record-setting amounts of alternative fuel, 16 March 2011, http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.phpaz=view_all&address=115x280888

External links

findarticles.com: Bacteria speeds drug to tumors - use of Clostridium acetobutylicum enzyme to activate cancer drug CB 1954.
EPA Clostridium acetobutylicum Final Risk Assessment
Carolina Bio Supply Living Culture Order Page
Genetic Engineering of Clostridium acetobutylicum for Enhanced Production of Hydrogen Gas: Penn State University.
Pathema-Clostridium Resource
US Patent 1,875,536, issued September, 1932, Wheeler et al.
US Patent 1,315,585, issued September, 1919, Weizmann
Applied Microbiology and Biotechnology, Volume 87, Issue 4, July 2010, Pages 1303-1315, 129 references, Trends and challenges in the microbial production of lignocellulosic bioalcohol fuels by Weber, C., Farwick, A., Benisch, F., Brat, D., Dietz, H., Subtil, T., Boles, Institute of Molecular Biosciences, Goethe-University Frankfurt Am Main, Max-von-Laue-Str. 9, Frankfurt am Main 60438, Germany. Cited only 4 times, (????), by others according to Computer searches made on 17 May 2011.

ISSN: 01757598 CODEN: AMBID DOI: 10.1007/s00253-010-2707-z PubMed ID: 20535464 Document Type: Short Survey Source Type: Journal

@@ Line 34: / Line 34: @@
 Unlike [[yeast]], which can digest [[sugar]] only into [[alcohol]] and [[carbon dioxide]], ''C. acetobutylicum'' and other Clostridia can digest [[whey]], [[sugar]], [[starch]], perhaps certain types of [[lignin]] yielding  butanol, [[propionic acid]], [[diethyl ether|ether]], and [[glycerin]]. Apart from the need for [[temperature]] control, the A.B.E. synthesis process is relatively simple. The products are however, completely miscible in water at the low concentrations produced by fermentation. In addition there is an [[azeotrope]] formed by both ethanol and water as well as Butanol and water. The azeotropes as well as the low concentrations of product lead to a relatively complicated separations process.
-==Some advantages claimed==
-[[Biobutanol]] supporters claim significant advantages over other [[biofuel]]s used to fuel [[internal combustion engine]] vehicles (ICEVs) and other liquid-fueled processes:
-* Butanol has a higher [[octane]] [[fuel value]] than [[gasoline]] with increased low-end torque. A [[V8]] [[Internal combustion engine|engine]] has been tested on a 10,000-mile U.S. tour supporting a U.S. Department of Energy grant in 2005. The results of the butanol auto fuel demonstration were presented to the [[U.S. Department of Energy]] [[National Renewable Energy Laboratory]]'s [http://www.cleanenergyforum.com Clean Energy Forum] in [[San Francisco]] on November 7, 2005.
-* Butanol does not readily adsorb moisture (it is not [[hygroscopic]]), so is less affected by changes in the weather, unlike the combustion of pure [[ethanol]], which requires engine and fuel system modifications.
-* Butanol does not attack materials commonly used in vehicular internal combustion engines.
-* Biobutanol can also be used in the industrial paint and solvent industry to replace fossil butanol. Stocks left after World War I from explosive cordite manufactures were used by the paints motorcar industry indeed.
 ==Some genetic engineering manipulations==