IS THERE SUCH THING AS A "STANDARD FERMENTOR"?

A fermentor or a bioreactor is just a specialised vessel which is designed to optimize cultivation of microorganisms or biotransformations. It does that by being able to provide the optimum conditions that can support the growth of high concentration of microorganisms.

As we are aware in our previous discussions that there are many types of fermentations involving various types of microorganisms of different physiological and biochemical characteristics. Therefore, there is no one single type of fermentor design that can carry out the various fermentations in one type of vessel or the "standard fermentor"

The illusion of having the so called standard fermentor probaly arise due to the popular representation of CSTR in many fermentation books.

Even though there is no single standard fermentor that covers all types of fermentation, all fermentors do share some common systems which is shared in most fermentors irrespective of the variance in design

The typical fermentation system exhibit systems such as:

1 Mixing system
2 Aeration system for aerobic fermentation
3 Sensor system
4 Sampling system
5 Heating or cooling system
6 Aseptic system for pure culture fermentation

Each system adopted by various fermentors may not be the same type but fulfill similar function. For example the mixing system may be carried out by magnetic stirring or different type of stirrers and impeller design

So what is important to us who intend to buy or operate a suitable fermentor system is to see what are our precise requirements and to ensure that the fermentor bought or built incorporate the particular systems we have in mind. Extra or unnecessary systems should be avoided.