Navodit Kumar Singh

Indian Institute of Technology Delhi, India

Medical grade Biopolymer production, characterization, and synthesis of NDDS (Nanoparticle drug delivery system) from an application perspective

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Biography

Abstract

The inevitable increase in world population has resulted in an increase in human plastic usage, which has resulted in an increase in plastic pollution due to the nonbiodegradable properties of plastic, which has deteriorated our environment. It has had a catastrophic effect on marine life, human health, the environment, waste streams, and landfills. Plastic made from petroleum finally pushed researchers to develop an alternative source for polymer synthesis in order to minimise their reliance on fossil fuels.

PHA, which possesses properties such as biocompatibility, biodegradability, thermoplasticity, and elastomeric nature, could be a viable alternative to polypropylene-derived polymers. Bacillus sp. has been investigated as a possible candidate for PHB production in both stirred tank reactors (STRs) and airlift reactors (ALRs), with the results indicating that increasing the volumetric mass transfer coefficient (KLa), gas holdup, and decreasing mixing time can improve yield and productivity. The current study sought to evaluate the utilisation of Bacillus sp. in the production of a medical-grade biopolymer (PHB). The first goal was to try to build a process for synthesizing PHB utilising a pneumatic bioreactor (Airlift Bioreactor) in different configurations, such as outer aeration mode, inner aeration mode, and bubble column mode. The effectiveness of these various arrangements was investigated in order to determine what might result in the highest PHB production. Moreover, stirred tank bioreactor (STR) experiments were conducted on PHB production using a cheap carbon substrate. That's because 40% of PHB's production costs come from the price of the carbon source material (Khosravi-Darani, Mokhtari, Amai, & Tanaka, 2013). Research was conducted using inexpensive carbon sources such crude glycerol, which is a renewable carbon source. Starting with media optimization in flasks, this research then moved on to optimising PHB production in the Batch mode, then to developing a mathematical model for the Batch process and the fed-batch process in MATLAB, and finally to scaling up PHB production from 3.5 litres to 15 litres in a bioreactor. Furthermore, PHB was extracted from bacterial cells using the Soxhlet technique. The PHB that had been extracted was characterised using a variety of further analytical tools, including FTIR, NMR, DSC, XRD, and others. Additionally, the application of PHB was developed in this study, which required developing a drug delivery system based on nanoparticles using the solvent evaporation technique.Numerous characterizations of the generated nanoparticles were carried out using a variety of analytical instruments, including FESEM, TEM, AFM, and DLS.