Enhancing the value of nitrogen from rapeseed meal for microbial oil production

Rapeseed meal, a major byproduct of biodiesel production, has been used as a low-cost raw material for the production of a generic microbial feedstock through a consolidated bioconversion process. Various strategies were tested for the production of a novel fermentation medium, rich in free amino nitrogen (FAN): commercial enzymes (CEs) (2.7 mg g(-1) dry meal), liquid state fungal pre-treatment (LSF) using Aspergillus oryzae (4.6 mg g(-1)), liquid state fungal pre-treatment followed by fungal autolysis (LSFA) (9.13 mg g(-1)), liquid state pre-treatment using fungal enzymatic broth (EB) (2.1 mg g(-1)), but the best strategy was a solid state fungal pre-treatment followed by fungal autolysis (34.5 mg g(-1)).