Edible Protein Production by Filamentous Fungi using Starch Plant Wastewater

The process to obtain starch from wheat requires high amounts of water, consequently generating large amounts of wastewater with very high environmental loading. This wastewater is traditionally sent to treatment facilities. This paper introduces an alternative method, where the wastewater of a wheat-starch plant is treated by edible filamentous fungi (Aspergillus oryzae and Rhizopus oryzae) to obtain a protein-rich biomass to be used as e.g. animal feed. The wastewater was taken from the clarified liquid of the first and second decanter (ED1 and ED2, respectively) and from the solid-rich stream (SS), whose carbohydrate and nitrogen concentrations ranged between 15 and 90 and 1.25–1.40 g/L, respectively. A. oryzae showed better performance than R. oryzae, removing more than 80% of COD after 3 days for ED1 and ED2 streams. Additionally, 12 g/L of dry biomass with protein content close to 35% (w/w) was collected, demonstrating the potential of filamentous fungi to be used in wastewater valorization. High content of fermentable solids in the SS sample led to high production of ethanol (10.91 g/L), which can be recovered and contribute to the economics of the process