Utilization of Fish waste Materials as a Source of Peptone Media

Abstract

Fish processing industries generate a high amount of waste with components that could be reutilized and converting them to value added products. Fish waste one of the rich sources of protein is considered as an excellent nitrogenous substrate for microbial growth. In the current study, we aimed to determine the potential use of fish waste material as a source of peptone media. Peptone has played a major role as a microbiological culture media and taking its approach in biopharmaceuticals and protein biotechnology in the production of therapeutic drugs and recombinant proteins (1). Experiments were performed to produce fish protein hydrolysates through enzymatic hydrolysis. The proteins, extracted from fish head sections were subjected to hydrolysis with different types of commercial enzymes and microbial extracellular proteases. The commercial enzyme Protamex was selected for its ability in producing protein hydrolysate with a hydrolyzed yield over 90%. Moreover, different bacterial species were isolated and screened to determine the protease production. Based on the screening data, five types of bacterial species with high proteolytic activities were considered in fish protein hydrolysis and a bacterial species belonging to the genus Bacillus was selected over other four bacteria to produce fish protein hydrolysates by considering the hydrolyzed yield and protein content. Peptone was produced under appropriate conditions after determining the optimum pH, temperature, hydrolysis time and substrate to enzyme ratio to use in specific applications. Ability in producing high quality fish peptones encourage the use of fish waste as a productive material and represent sustainable strategy in circular economy.