Succinic acid production from lignocellulosic hydrolysate by Basfia succiniciproducens

• This is the first report of B. succiniciproducens performance in hydrolysate.
• Succinic acid yields are higher in biomass hydrolysates than pure sugars.
• The side product lactic acid decreases significantly when using biomass hydrolysate.
• The bacterium detoxifies furfural and HMF to furfuryl- and HMF-alcohol.
• A stoichiometric model was utilized to analyze the side product distributions.

The production of chemicals alongside fuels will be essential to enhance the feasibility of lignocellulosic biorefineries. Succinic acid (SA), a naturally occurring C4-diacid, is a primary intermediate of the tricarboxylic acid cycle and a promising building block chemical that has received significant industrial attention. Basfia succiniciproducens is a relatively unexplored SA-producing bacterium with advantageous features such as broad substrate utilization, genetic tractability, and facultative anaerobic metabolism. Here B. succiniciproducens is evaluated in high xylose-content hydrolysates from corn stover and different synthetic media in batch fermentation. SA titers in hydrolysate at an initial sugar concentration of 60 g/L reached up to 30 g/L, with metabolic yields of 0.69 g/g, and an overall productivity of 0.43 g/L/h. These results demonstrate that B. succiniciproducens may be an attractive platform organism for bio-SA production from biomass hydrolysates.