Enzyme complexes production by A. niger from soybean under solid state fermentation

Soybean has a wide availability of biochemical compounds as proteins, polysaccharides, lipids, carbohydrates, minerals, vitamins, fibers, lecithin, among others, making interesting its employment as substrate for solid state fermentation. Although the process of SSF is not extensively used industrially like the submerged fermentation (SmF), it can be a viable alternative, since presents higher results of productivity, especially at the cultivation of filamentous fungi and enzymes production. In this way, this study compared the production of different types of enzymes through solid-state fermentation, using different types of soybean cultures (organic, transgenic and conventional) with the fungus A. niger. We accomplished the characterization of the substrates for the production of amylase, protease and lipase, evaluation of the growth curves of the microorganism and the optimal conditions of enzymes production using experimental design. The highest enzyme activities in the study of fermentation parameters were observed for the protease, using conventional soybeans with initial moisture of 50%, 144h of fermentation, initial inoculum concentration of 4.106 spores g(-1) and particle size of 0.6 mm. The study of process optimization indicated that the best results of enzyme activity for the protease were obtained at pH 3.0 and particle size of soybean fragmentation of 0.6 mm.