Immobilization method of Lactobacillus casei cells was investigated using alginate capsules that possess an interphosic membrane and a liquid core. The capsules were found to offer more space for cellular growth than gel-core beads. However, the Ca-alginate structure was unstable during repeated batch fermentations for lactic acid production.
Immobilization method of Lactobacillus casei cells was investigated using alginate capsules that possess an interphosic membrane and a liquid core. The capsules were found to offer more space for cellular growth than gel-core beads. However, the Ca-alginate structure was unstable during repeated batch fermentations for lactic acid production.
Immobilization method of Lactobacillus casei cells was investigated using alginate capsules that possess an interphosic membrane and a liquid core. The capsules were found to offer more space for cellular growth than gel-core beads. However, the Ca-alginate structure was unstable during repeated batch fermentations for lactic acid production.
cells in liquid-core alginate capsules for lactic acid production Ik-Keun Yoo,* Gi Hun Seong ,* Ho Nam Chang,* and Joong Kon Park *Department of Chemical Engineering and BioProcess Engineering Research Center, Korea Advanced institute of Science and Technology (EXI ST), Taejon, Korea Department of Chemical Engineering, Kyungpook National University, Taegu, Korea The immobilization method of Lactobacillus casei cells was investigated using alginate capsules that possess an interphosic membrane and a liquid core. The capsules were found to offer more space for cellular growth than gel-core beads, which resulted in I.5-fold higher cell concentration than in the latter; however, the Ca-alginate structure was unstable during repeated batch fermentations for lactic acid production. Ba-alginate capsules were chemically and physically more stable than the Ca-alginate capsules in phosphate and lactate solutions. Attempts were also made to use various hardening agents to stabilize the structure of the Ba-alginate capsules. It was found that the treatment with a mixture of chitosan and BaCl, solution gave the best results for hardening. Finally, stable lactic acid production was possible with a productivity of more than 2.7 g l-h- by L. casei cells immobilized in chitosan-coated Ba-alginate capsules. The cell leakage from the capsules was maintained rela- tively low during repeated batch fermentations. Keywords: Lactic acid; barium-alginate capsules; encapsulation; alginate gel stability; Lactobucillus casei Introduction Given the low productivity of batch processes for lactic acid production, recent research has focused on increasing the cell concentration in the reactor.14 Cell immobilization is one of the most attractive methods in maintaining high cell concentration in the reactor and has been extensively stud- ied. Among various cell immobilization methods, entrap- ment in Ca-alginate beads has commonly been used for immobilization of lactic acid bacteria.4-9 On the other hand, encapsulation of cells in a liquid-core capsule which offers more space for cellular growth than entrapment will be a good method for a high density culture. In the previous work of our group, encapsulation of yeast cells in a Ca- alginate capsule based on Nigam et al. l1 was developed; however, Ca-alginate gels are chemically unstable on con- Address reprint requests to Dr. Ho Nam Chang, Director, Bioprocess En- gineering Research Center, Korea Advanced Inst. of Science and Technol- ogy, Daeduk Science Town, Taejon 305-701, South Korea Received 29 June 1995; revised 27 November 1995; accepted 11 January 1996 Enzyme and Microbial Technology 18: 0 1996 by Elsevier Science Inc. 655 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10010 tact with various cation-chelating agents such as phosphate, citrate, and lactate which can cause bead disruption or dis- solution.* Many hardening techniques have been investi- gated to improve the stability of Ca-alginate gels9,* but most procedures are complicated, time consuming, and/or costly. Recently, it was reported that barium alginate beads were chemically and physically more stable in electrolyte solutions than conventional calcium alginate beads.13,14 The aim of this investigation was to compare the method of entrapment and encapsulation of Lactobacillus casei cells in Ca-alginate gels. Also, different metal ions other than calcium and various coating agents were tested to improve the stability of alginate gel in a lactate solution. Finally, the production of lactic acid with chemically stabilized alginate capsules containing L. casei cells was studied. Materials and methods Materials Sodium alginate (Na-alginate) was obtained from Junsei (Tokyo, Japan, Cat. No. 13035-1201). Xanthan gum (Cat. No. G1253), chitosan (Cat. No. C3646), and polyethyleneimine (PEI, Cat. No. P3143) were supplied by Sigma (St. Louis, MO, U.S.). Yeast extract and MRS medium were from Difco (Detroit, MI, U.S.). All other chemicals were of reagent grade quality. Enzyme and Microbial Technology 19:426-433, 1996 0 1996 by Elsevier Science Inc. 655 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10010 0141-0229/96/$15.00 PII SOl41-0229(96)00016-6 Encapsulation of Lactabacillus casei cells in liquid-core: I.-K. Yoo et al. ~~crooorga~ism and substrate L. cusei ssp. r~~nosus (ATCC 10863) was used throughout this investigation, The strain was maintained at 4C on MRS-agar. The production medium consisted of 40 ml MRS broth or GY medium containing per liter: 1 g Na-acetate * 3H,O; 0.5 g K,HPO,; 0.5 g K&PO,; 0.2 g MgSO, - 7H,O; 0.03 g MnSO, - H,O; and 0.03 g FeSO, * 7H,O. Glucose, yeast extract, and CaCo, concentrations were variable. Immobilization of cells Encapsulation. Cells of L. casei for encapsulation were obtained from culture grown in 50 ml of MRS broth at 42C for 24 h. The cells were harvested from the fe~entation broth by cen~~gation at 10,000 g for 10 min and washed thoroughly with 0.85% saline. The cells were resuspended in 10 ml of a 1.0% (w/v) sterile CaCl, or BaCl, solution containing 0.15% (w/v) xanthan gum. This cell suspension with a density of about 0.4 g dry wt. 1-l was dropped through a 22G bluntly ended needle into 130 ml of sterile 0.6% (w/v) Na-alginate and 0.1% (v/v) Tween 20 solution stirred by a magnetic bar. Xanthan gum and Tween 20 were used for making clean spherical capsules. The schematic diagram of the experimen- tal apparatus was the same as that described in our previous work. The capsules formed were washed with sterile saline to remove excess sodium alginate. The capsules were resuspended in various coating and hardening solutions stirred with a magnetic bar for 30 min. A 1.0% CaCl, solution was used for hardening of Ca-alginate capsules. The chitosan solution for the Ba-alginate capsule coating was prepared as described by Yoshioka et a1.l5 The coating solutions were discarded and the resulting alginate capsules (3-3.5 mm diameter) were washed with sterile saline. Entrapment. Harvested cells (0.04 g dry weight) were mixed with 100 ml of a 1 .O% sterile sodium alginate solution. The mixture was added dropwise into a sterile 1.0% CaCl, solution at room tem- perature while stirring it continuously. The beads were hardened in this solution for 1 h. The beads (2-2.5 mm diameter) were then washed with sterile saline prior to use to remove excess calcium ions and untrapped cells. Fe~e~tation conditions A 50 ml sample of immobilized cells prepared above was first grown in 150 ml MRS broth at 42C for 24 h. Batch fermentations were then performed in 250-ml Erlenmeyer flasks containing 40 ml of medium and 15-40 ml of alginate beads or capsules with immobilized cells. For the cultures grown in GY medium, 2.5-5 g of CaCO, was added to the flasks to prevent significant decrease in pH by produced lactic acid. The flasks were incubated at 42C in a shaking incubator (Vision Scientific Co., Seoul, Korea) ad- justed to 100 pm. After each batch fermentation, beads or cap- sules were washed two times with fresh medium for the next batch culture. Analytical rnet~~ds Free cell concentrations were determined by measuring the optical density (OD) of the fermentation broth at 620 mn using a standard curve to correlate OD and dry cell weight. For the cultures grown in GY medium, the optical density was measured after removing CaCO, particles with 1 M HCl. The cell density within Ca-alginate beads or capsules was determined after dissolving the beads or capsules in McIkaine buffer (0.2 M Na$POd, 0.1 M citric acid). The number of viable cells liberated from the Ca-alginate gels was obtained by plating appropriate dilutions on MRS agar and incu- bating them at 42C for 36 h. In the case of Ba-alginate capsules, capsules were placed in a 0.5 M EDTA solution with continuous stirring and then broken by pinching, since the McIlvaine buffer was not effective for liquefying Ba-alginate capsules. After cells were completely released from the ruptured capsules, cell density inside the capsules was determined by measuring the optical den- sity at 620 nm. The lactic acid concentration was measured by HPLC using an Aminex HPX-87H column (Bio-Rad Co., Rich- mond, VA, U.S.) and a refractive index detector (Hitachi L-6000. Tokyo, Japan). Glucose concentration was determined by enzy- matic assay kits of Glucose-E kits (Youngdong Pharm. Co.. Seoul. Korea). Results are the average of at least three independent trials. Statistical analyses on the data were carried out by using Duncans new multiple range test. Results and discussion Comparison of encapsulation and entrapment for lactic acid production Lactic acid production by encapsulated cells was compared with that by entrapped cells using Ca-alginate gels. Figure 1 shows the lactic acid production during the second and third batch of fermentations in 40 ml of MRS broth con- taining 0.5 g 1-l CaCI, and 15 ml of alginate beads or capsules with immobilized cells. The addition of CaCl, was done to keep the capsules from swelling as reported in our previous work. As shown in Figure I , the Ca-alginate beads showed a little higher but not statistically significant (P > 0.05) rate of lactic acid Production (1.9 1 g 1-l h-) than that by the capsules (1.75 gl- h-) during the first 7 h of the second batch; however, during the 20 h of the third batch, 0 0 5 10 15 20 Time (h) Figure 1 Comparison of the lactic acid production by Ca- alginate entrapped and encapsulated L. casei cells during the second and third batch of fermentations: second batch with cap- sules, 0; third batch with capsules, 0; second batch with beads, q ; and third batch with beads, W. Bars indicate standard devia- tion from the mean on the basis of four replicate experiments Enzyme Microb. Technot., 1996, vol. 19, November 1 429 Papers the production rate by the beads (0.625 gl- h-l) signifi- cantly decreased (P < 0.05) compared with that by the cap- sules (0.81 g l-h-l). As reported earlier,1037 this could be due to the limitation in increasing biomass per unit volume of the conventional gel-core beads. Figure 2 shows the com- parison of the cell densities within both immobilized ma- trices during repeated batch fermentations in terms of dry cell weight per liter of gels and the number of viable cells per milliliter of gels. As can be seen, there was no increase in dry cell weight within beads during the third batch fer- mentation, while the number of viable cells remarkably de- creased compared with that after the second batch. The cell density inside the Ca-alginate capsules after the third batch was about 65 g dry wt 1-l gels, which was 1.5-fold higher than that of the beads. Until the third batch, the free cell concentrations were less than 0.15 g dry wt 1-l in both immobilized matrices. In the fourth batch, serious leakage of cells was observed in the beads and the free cell concen- tration was more than 0.8 g dry wt 1-l while significant cell leakage was not observed in the capsules yet (0.2 g dry wt 1-l). The latter may be due to the barrier effect of the cap- sule membrane. In the gel-core beads formed by the con- ventional method, cells are homogeneously distributed both near the surface of and inside the beads at the stage of bead formation. During fermentation, the cells inside the beads grow poorer than near the surface of beads due to mass transfer limitation. The cells may then be released into the surrounding medium once the matrix space near the surface of beads has been occupied. On the other hand, the inter- phasic membrane of the capsule can act as a barrier to retain microbial cells inside the capsule. The fermentation using a GY medium containing 50 g 1-l glucose and 15 g 1-l yeast extract was carried out with 15 ml of Ca-alginate capsules. As shown in Figure 3a, the final concentrations of lactic acid produced in three repeated fer- mentations were almost the same even though the rate of 100 3 % M z 80 B 10 0 1 2 3 Repeated batch No. Figure 2 Comparison of the cell density within Ca-alginate capsules and beads during repeated batch fermentations: im- mobilized cells within capsules, 0; viable cells within capsules, 0; immobilized cells within beads, Cl; and viable cells within beads, H r^ g 0.6 F u f 0.4 = 8 8 2 0.2 t 00 Time (h) Figure 3 Time profiles of lactic acid production (a) and cell leakage (b) during repeated batch fermentations by Ca-alginate- encapsulated cells: (symbols are for graph a, graph b). First batch (0, 0); second batch (Cl, n ); and third batch (A, A). The standard deviation from the mean is based on three replicate experiments lactic acid production in the third batch was slightly slower than the previous ones. During fermentations with MRS medium, the addition of 0.5 g 1-l CaCl, could prevent the capsules from swelling and also cell leakage from the cap- sules to some extent. On the other hand, the free cell density in GY medium containing 0.5 g 1-i CaCl, even after the third batch significantly increased compared to that after the second batch (P < 0.05) as shown in Figure 3b; therefore, it could be concluded that a higher concentration of lactic acid brought about a decrease in the stability of Ca-alginate structure. Enhancement of capsule stability in lactate solution Although there have been numerous reports on the $J;%; tion of lactic acid with Ca-alginate entrapped cells, the problem of cell leakage was not solved yet due to the decalcification of Ca-alginate beads by lactic acid.6V8 We first investigated the stability of alginate capsules gelled with various metal ions besides Ca2+ in a high concentration of phosphate and lactate solution. Among the tested metal ions such as Ba*+, Fe3+, Mn2+, Zn+, and Ca*+, only the 430 Enzyme Microb. Technol., 1996, vol. 19, November 1 Encapsulation of Lactobacillus casei ceils in liquid-core: I.-K. Yoo et al. b~um-gelled aiginate capsules remained stable for more than 100 h at a concentration of 0.1 M phosphate and 0.5 M Na-lactate solution (pH 6 at 42C). The capsules gelled with other ions swelled with time and eventually disinte- grated in less than 3 h. When making Ca-alginate beads, it has been a common procedure to harden the preformed beads in a CaCl, solution for a while. In this study, various coating agents were investigated for the hardening solution of the preformed barium alginate capsules in the hopes that the gel stability would be more enhanced. Based on previ- ous reports, 2y20,2 the following solutions were prepared for a hardening solution of the preformed Ba-alginate capsules: 1.0% (w/v) BaCl, solution; 0.5% BaCl, and 0.5% gelatin solution; 0.5% BaCl, and 0.5% PEI solution; 0.5% BaCI, and 0.5% chitosan solution; and 0.1 M Al(NO,), solution. After treatment with the above hardening solutions for 30 min, the Ba-alginate capsules were placed in the solution of 0.1 M phosphate and 0.5 M Na-lactate for 100 h. The gela- tin-or Al(NO,),-hardened capsules were easily crushed be- tween two fingers compared to the other capsules; therefore, the Ba-alginate capsules treated with the other hardening solutions such as BaCl,, PEI, and chitosan were selected for encapsulation of L. casei cells. As shown in Figure 4, the lactic acid production and the leakage of cells using 25 ml of Ba-alginate capsules were compared with the Ca-alginate ones. In these fermentations, CaCl, was not added to the MRS medium, so we observed a rem~kable increase in free cell density as the Ca-alginate capsules with immobilized cells were used for four repeated batches. Treatment of Ba-alginate capsules with PEI as pro- posed by Veliky and WilliamszO was ineffective to avoid cell leakage and caused severe shrinkage of the capsules. As can be seen. the free cell ~oncen~ations in the Ba-alginate capsules treated with 1% BaCl, solution were not signifi- cantly different (P > 0.05) from those in the capsules treated with a mixture of 0.5% chitosan and 0.5% BaCl,; however, the capsules treated with a mixture of chitosan and BaCl, were a little stronger between two fingers than the capsules treated with only BaCl, solution. Consequently, a mixture of 0.5% chitosan and 0.5% BaCl, was used for hardening solution in the following fermentations. The cell densities inside the capsules after the fourth batch were in the range of 70-80 g dry wt I- gels. Lactic acid production by immobilized L. casei cells in alginate capsule Batch fe~entations were performed using a GY medium containing 30 g 1-l yeast extract and supplemented to con- tain 40, 70, and 100 g I- of glucose. Figure 5a shows the time courses of lactic acid production by 25 ml of Ba- alginate capsules with immobilized cells treated with a mix- ture of 0.5% chitosan and 0.5% BaCl,. There was little difference in the rates of lactic acid production between the fermentations with different initial glucose concentrations. During the first 12.5 h of fermentation, the productivities of lactic acid were 2.9, 3.3, and 3.1 g I-h-l in the medium with 40, 70, and 100 g 1-l of glucose, respectively. The highest concentration of lactic acid (98.1 g 1-l) was obtained in the medium with 100 g 1-l glucose; no residual glucose was found after 32 h of fermentation. Nomura et al. re- 0.0 0 4 8 Time (h) Figure 4 Time profiles of lactic acid production (a) and ceils leakage (b) during the fourth batch of fermentation by alginate capsules treated with various hardening agents (symbols are for graph a, graph b). Ca-alginate capsules (0, W; Ba-alginate cap- sules hardened by a BaCI, solution FY, VI; Ba-alginate capsules hardened by a mixture of PEI and BaCI, (A, A); and Ba-alginate capsules hardened by a mixture of chitosan and BaCI, (0, m). The standard deviation from the mean is based on three repli- cate experiments ported that the m~imum condensation of lactic acid (80 g I-) was obtained by L. delbrueckii entrapped in Ca-alginate beads after 120 h of fermentation while Roukas and Kotzekidou reported that the maximum concentration of lactic acid (41.3 g 1-l) was observed with coimmobilized L. casei and L. luctis cells in Ca-alginate beads after 48 h of fermentation. A yeast extract concentration varied from 5-30 g 1-l in a GY medium containing 70 g 1-l of glucose. As shown in Figure 5b, the rate of lactic acid production by encapsulated cells increased concomi~~y with the increase of yeast ex- tract concentration. For instance, the productivities of lactic acid during the first 9.5 h of fermentation were 2.6, 3.3, and 3.5 g I-h- in the medium with 5, 15, and 30 g 1-i of yeast extract, respectively. This difference seems to be due to a higher concen~ation of yeast extract resulting in a higher growth rate of cells inside the capsules. At the end of fer- mentations, cell mass concentrations inside the capsules reached approximately 70, 100, and 110 g dry wt I- gels in Enzyme Microb. Technol., 1996, vol. 19, November 1 431 Papers 100 80 ti) 60 .L( Y *a 8 40 ha 20 0 80; 5 10 15 20 25 30 ; 0 5 LO 15 20 25 Time(h) Figure 5 Time courses of lactic acid production by chitosan- and BaCI,-coated Ba-alginate encapsulated ceils in media with different initial glucose (a) and yeast extract (bi concentrations (g I-): G 40 and YE 30,O; G 70 and YE 30, Cl; GIOO and YE 30, A; G 70 and YE 15, g; and G 70 and YE 5, 0 where glucose is G and yeast extract is YE the medium with 5, 15, and 30 g 1-l of yeast extract, re- spectively. Guoqiang et ~1.~ reported that the productivity of lactic acid by L. casei immobilized in Ca-alginate beads was 1.6 g l-h-l in the medium with 10 g 1-l yeast extract. Repeated batch fermentations were carried out five times successively using 40 ml of Ba-alginate capsules with im- mobilized cells. As shown in Figure 6, the conversions of glucose to lactic acid were in the similar range besides the fifth batch when the fermentation medium was replaced with a fresh one every 24 h. Until the fourth batch, the productivity of lactic acid during 24 h of fermentation was more than 2.7 g l-h-i and no residual glucose was found; however, in the fifth batch, the pr~uctivity was less than 2.6 g I-h- and the concentration of residual glucose was about 2 g I-. Cell leakage from the capsules was main- tained relatively low during repeated fermentations; the concentration of free cells after five batches was less than 0.28 g dry wt 1-l. By contrast, the concentration of free cells in the fermentation broth using Ca-alginate capsules with 0 3 Y c7 20 ~ t 4 i 0.6 s L 1 i? u 0.4 s OIOO 0 1 2 3 4 5 Repeated batch No. Figure 6 Lactic acid production (0) and cells leakage (0) during repeated batch fermentations by ~hitosan-coated Ba-alginate encapsulated cells in GY media containing 70 g I- glucose and 15 g I- yeast extract. Recycling took place every 24 h immobilized cells was more than 0.55 g dry wt 1-i even after three batches as shown in Figure 3b. Boyaval and Goulet6 reported that serious cell leakage due to the decal- cification of Ca-alginate beads was observed during con- tinuous lactic acid fe~en~tion by L. ~e~vetic~~ entrapped in Ca-alginate beads. Champagne et al9 found that a double coating of poly-r,-lysine and alginate reduced cell leakage by a factor of approximately 50 during milk fermentation by Luctococcus la& immobilized in Ca-alginate beads. Conclusion The entrapment in conventions Ca-alginate beads has been a popular method for immobilization of lactic acid bacteria; however, it seems that there are two disadvantages for lactic acid production using immobilized cells in Ca-alginate beads. One is the limitation of space for cellular growth due to gel-core structure and the other is an instability of Ca- alginate structure due to the decalcification of Ca-alginate beads by lactic acid. In this study, the encapsulation method in alginate capsules was used for immobilization of L,. casei cells. It was found that the encapsulation method gave higher cell density and lactic acid productivity compared to the entrapment. The stability of alginate capsules was also improved using Ba2+ as the gelling agent for alginate in- stead of Ca*+ and a mixture of chitosan and BaCl, as the hardening solution for the preformed Ba-alginate capsules. References I. 2. Bibal, B., Vayssier, Y., Goma, G., and Pareiileux. A. High- concentration cultivation of L.4acrococcus cremons in a ceil-recycle reactor. Biotechnol. Bioeng. 1991, 37,14&754 Norton, S., Lacroix, C., and Vuillemard, J.-C. Kinetic study of con- tinuous whey permeate fermentation by immobilized Lmrobacillus helveticus for lactic acid production. Enzyme Microb. Technol. 1994, 16,457-m 432 Enzyme Microb. Technot., 1996, vol. 19, November 1 Encapsulaiion of Lactobacillus casei ceils in liquid-core: I.-K. Yoo et al. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. Il. 12. Kaufman, E. N., Cooper, S. P., Clement, S. L., and Little, M. H. Use of a biparticle fluidized-bed bioreactor for the continuous and si- multaneous fermentation and purification of lactic acid. Appl. Bio- them. Biotech. 1994,45146,605-620 Wang, H., Seki, M., and Furusaki, S. Characteristics of immo~Iized ~cfob~cill~s de~br~eck~i in a liquid-sold ~uidized bed bioreactor for lactic acid production 1. Chem. Eng. Japan 1995,28, 198-203 Nomura, Y., Iwahara, M., and Hongo, M. Lactic acid production by electrodialysis fermentation using immobilized growing cells. Bio- tech&. Bioeng. 1987, 30, 788-793 Boyaval, P. and Goulet, J. Optimal conditions for production of lactic acid from cheese whey permeate by Ca-alginate entrapped Lacrobacillus helveticus. Enzyme Microb. Techol. 1988, 10, 725- 728 Guoqiang. D., Kaul, R., and Mattiasson, B. Evaluation of alginate- immobilized ~cfobuc~l~ffs casei for lactate pr~ucti~n. A&. Mi- crobiol. B~ofech~o~. 1991, 36, 309-314 Roy, I).. Goulet, J.. and Le Duy, A. Continuous production of Iactic acid from whey permeate by free and calcium alginate entrapped lutobacillus helvericus. J. Dairy Sci. 1987, 70, 506-513 Champagne, C. P., Gaudy, C., Poncelet, D., and Neufeld, R. J. Ix- tococcus lacfis release from calcium alginate beads. Appl. Environ. Microbial. 1992, 58, 1429-1434 Cheong, S. H., Park, J. K., Kim, B. S., and Chang, H. N. Microen- capsulation of yeast cells in the calcium alginate membrane. Bio- trchnol. Tech. 1993. 7, 879-884 Nigam, S. C.. Tsao, I. F., Sakoda, A., and Wang, H. Y. Techniques for preparing hydrogel membrane capsules. Biotechnol. Tech. 1988, 2, 27 I-276 Bimbaum. S.. Pendleton, R., Larsson, P., and Mosbach K. Covalent 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21. stabilization of alginate gel for the entrapment of living whole cells. Biorechnol. Left. 1981, 3, 3931100 Tanaka. H. and Irie, S. Preparation of stable alginate gel beads in electrolyte solutions using Baa and Sr. Biotechnol. Tech. 1988,2, 1 is-120 Lee. C. Y., Choi, S. K., and Chang, H. N. Effect of various factors on the operationai stability of immob~Iized cells for acrylamide production in a packed bed reactor. J. Microbioi. Biotechnol. 1993. 3, 39-45 Yoshioka, T., Hirano, R., Shioya, T.. and Kako, M. Encapsulation of mammalian cell with chitosan-CMC capsule. Biotechnol. Bioeng. 1990, 35,66-72 Dowdy, S. and Wearden. S. Sfatisfics jiw Research. John Wiley & Sons, New York, 1983.262-269 Groboillot. A. F., Champagne, C. P., Darling, G. D.. Poncelet, D., and Neufeld, R. J. Membrane fo~ation by interfacial cross-linking of chitosan for mic~encapsulation of Luttncocctrs lanis. Biorech- nol. Bioeng. 1993, 42, I 157-l 163 Roukas, T. and Kotzekidou. P. Production of lactic acid from de- proteinized whey by coimmobilized Lcrctobacillus casei and Lacro- coccus lactis cells. Enzyme Microb. Technol. 1991, 13, 33-38 Stenroos, S. L.. Linko, Y. Y.. and Linko. P. Production of L-lactic acid with immobilized Lwrobocillu.\ delbrueckii. Biotechnol. Left. 1982, 4, 159-164 Veliky, I. A. and Williams, R. E. The production of ethanol by S~zechurom~ce~ cerevisiur jmmobilized in poIycation-stabilized cat- cium alginate gels. B~ofec~nu~. Lerr. 198 3. 3, 275-280 Rochefort, W. E., Rehg. T.. and Chau, P. C. Trivalent cation stabi- lization of alginate gel for cell immobilization. Bintduznl. Lett 1986.8, 115-120 Enzyme Microb. Technol., 1996, vol. 19, November 1 433