Oxygen availability and the growth of Escherichia coli W3110: A problem exacerbated by scale-up

By examining the effects of oxygen availability on the batch growth of Escherichia coli on glucose the present study seeks to determine the responses of growing cells to varying degrees of oxygen excess, limitation or starvation as might be experienced in an industrial-scale bioreactor. It was found that as the degree of oxygen limitation increases so too does the byproduct acetate production in addition to a concomitant decrease in the substrate based biomass yield coefficient and maximum specific growth rate. Similar, although not as severe, responses to excess oxygen growth conditions were also observed. This result supports the concept of oxygen being potentially toxic to growing organisms, resulting in, at the very least, a degree of inhibition.