Screening and production of biosurfactant from Lactobacillus plantarum

Biosurfactant production from microbial source has received extensive attention over the past few decades. The current trend on biosurfactant production is mostly due to their broad range of functional properties, diverse synthetic capabilities of microorganisms, environmental acceptability, easy biodegradability and low toxicity. The major focus of this research work is to evaluate the ability of probiotic bacteria Lactobacillus plantarum to produce biosurfactant using various screening methods. Different screening methods namely Hemolytic Assay, Tilted Glass Test, Oil Spread Assay, Drop Collapse Test, Penetration Assay, Emulsification Index, Bacterial Adhesion to Hydrocarbons were used to assess the ability of Lactobacillus plantarum to produce biosurfactants. The dry weight of the produced biosurfactant is 0.476g/L. Preliminary characterization of biosurfactants was carried out using Thin Layer Chromatography. Yellow spots appeared on TLC plate confirmed that the surfactants are glycolipid in nature. Thus the present study suggests a set of screening techniques for biosurfactant production from the benevolent strains of probiotic bacterium Lactobacillus plantarum.