Mutation breeding of lycopene-producing strain Blakeslea trispora by a novel atmospheric and room temperature plasma (ARTP).

To improve the fermentation efficiency of lycopene, a plasma jet, driven by an active helium atom supplied with atmospheric and room temperature plasma (ARTP) biological breeding system, was used as a new method to generate mutations in Blakeslea trispora (-). After several rounds of screening, a mutant A5 with high concentration of lycopene and dry biomass was isolated, which showed a maximum lycopene concentration (26.4 ± 0.2 mg/g dry biomass) which was 55 % higher than the parent strain (16.9 ± 0.3 mg/g dry biomass) in the production of lycopene. Compared with parent strain, B. trispora A5 required less dissolved oxygen (10 % less than that of parent strain) to reach maximum concentration in a 5-L stirred tank reactor batch fermentation.