Production of bioemulsifiers by Yarrowia lipolytica in sea water using diesel oil as the carbon source

the objective of this work was to investigate, on a flask scale, the production of bioemulsifiers by yarrowia lipolytica in the presence of sea water, supplemented with nitrogen and phosphate sources, using diesel oil as substrate. a full 24 factorial design was conducted to investigate the effects and interactions of the nutrient concentrations (diesel oil, urea, ammonium sulfate and monobasic potassium phosphate) on the response variables: emulsification activity and surface tension of the cell-free cultures. high emulsification activities (> 5,4 uea) were determined after 168 h in all the experiments. the interactions among diesel oil, urea and monobasic potassium phosphate favored the emulsification with statistical significance. a correlation between the increase of emulsification activity and the reduction of surface tension was not identified.