Isolation, production and characterization of polyhydroxybutyrate from Bacillus cereus JF-760212

Polyhydroxybutyrate is a polyhydroxyalkonate, a polymer belonging to the polyester class. It is regarded as a source of potentially useful biodegradable natural plastic such as polypropylene. PHB accumulate as reserve energy material in the cytoplasm of certain bacteria during unbalanced growth conditions. As the production cost of PHB is quite high compared to non - degradable plastics, the present work has been focused on the isolation of potential bacterial strains with high PHB accumulating ability. PHB producing Bacillus strain was isolated through standard protocols and identified using Nile Blue A staining technique. The dye induces florescence on binding to the polymer. Further, PHB was extracted using sodium hypochlorite and its chemical nature of the material was confirmed using UV, IR and NMR analysis.