Biohydrogen production by microbial communities isolated from biogas plant slurry using glucose as substrate

Hydrogen energy is the finest choice as it is the only clean carbon neutral fuel which can in the long run substitute the present petroleum based economy. At present commercial production of hydrogen relies on fossil fuels only, so biologically produced hydrogen is becoming the centre of attraction. This study has endeavoured to determine the capability of facultative anaerobic bacteria to produce biohydrogen through anaerobic fermentation. The bacterial seed inoculums were collected from different biogas plant slurry. The pure bacterial colonies were isolated through standard microbiological methods. The anaerobic fermentation was carried out with glucose as substrate in air tight erlenmeyer flask. The identification and characterisation of bacteria were performed by standard methods, which revealed that the strains belonged to Enterobacter sp., Citrobacter sp., Proteus sp., Providencia sp.and Klebsiella sp. The gas chromatographic results revealed that hydrogen gas evolved from all the samples with maximum production with Enterobacter sp. (27.08%) followed by Citrobacter sp. (25.81%), Klebsiella sp. (18.25%), Providencia sp. (7.19%) and least for Proteus sp. (0.45%).