Varanasi: Scientists employ dark fermentation and computational modelling to produce green hydrogen from agro-waste.
Researchers at the Indian Institute of Technology (BHU) have developed a process for producing green hydrogen from sugarcane bagasse using a newly isolated bacterial strain. The development leverages dark fermentation, a low-energy, anaerobic method offering a potential pathway for cleaner and more cost-effective biohydrogen production in India.
The work was carried out at the Biomolecular Engineering Laboratory of the School of Biochemical Engineering and has been published in peer-reviewed journals such as International Journal of Hydrogen Energy and Fuel.
The research team, led by Prof Abha Mishra, isolated a hydrogen-producing bacterial strain, Alcaligenes ammonioxydans SRAM, from sewage sludge wastewater. The strain demonstrated significant efficiency in converting sugarcane bagasse, an abundant agricultural by-product in Uttar Pradesh, into hydrogen gas.
The bacterium has been registered with the NCBI GenBank. According to the researchers, the strain functions as a biocatalyst capable of breaking down lignocellulosic biomass without the need for energy-intensive processes or external light sources.
To optimise hydrogen yield, the team employed computational modelling tools, including artificial neural networks (ANN) using MATLAB and Python-based simulations. These tools helped identify and fine-tune key parameters such as pH, substrate concentration, and fermentation time, improving reproducibility and process efficiency.
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