Identification of a novel hydrogen producing bacteria from sugarcane bagasse waste

A new hydrogen producing strain with potent cellulose degrading ability was isolated from soil sample collected from sugarcane bagasse (SCB) storage yard. Among the colonies screened, the newly identified strain, Bacillus subtilis AuChE413 has shown better performance in terms of hydrogen yield and cellulose degradation. Morphological, physiological, and biochemical traits of the isolated strain were studied. And its molecular characterization was studied by analyzing the sequence of 16S rRNA gene. The sequence of Bacillus subtilis AuChE413 was compared with other GenBank sequences using BLASTn to study its homology with other species. Phylogenetic tree was constructed using the neighbor joining method. The hydrogen production capacity of Bacillus subtilis AUChE413 was tested by employing the pretreated SCB and sweet sorghum stalk biomass (SSB) as substrates. In comparison, the substrate sorghum stalk has produced the highest hydrogen yield of 55.2 l H2 /kg SSB at pH 7 and 37 °C.