Surfactants are essential for a wide variety of biotechnological applications in areas of food, cosmetics, household cleaning products, agriculture, oil recovery, and environmental remediation. Despite great progress, there remain opportunities for research on metabolic engineering and bioproduction of microbial biosurfactants in terms of process efficiency and diversity of available compounds. Moreover, with the increasing demand for renewable, biodegradable ingredients, research must focus on improving the sustainability of surfactants and the shift away from sulfate-based and other non-renewable surfactants.

Microbial biosurfactants are green molecules with high application potential in environmental and industrial sectors. Chemical diversity of biosurfactants allows them versatility and broad range surfactants capability without compromising performance or economic viability. Biosurfactants are used as emulsifiers, dispersants, wetting agents, oil recovery agents, biopesticides, stabilizers, solubilizers, and bioremediation agents (pesticide, heavy metals and oil spill cleanup). This comprehensive book on biosurfactants and their environmental and industrial applications offers a broad spectrum of information on potential applications of biosurfactants in various fields and related technological developments.

Microbial biosurfactant compounds are a group of structurally diverse molecules produced by microorganisms, and are mainly categorized according to their chemical structure. The diversity of microbial biosurfactants makes them versatile and means that they offer a range of capabilities, while at the same time being economically sustainable. As such, they have potential applications in environmental processes, as well as in food, biomedicine and other industries. This book discusses innovative approaches and cutting-edge research that utilize the various properties of biosurfactants. Drawing on research from around the globe, it provides an up-to-date review of biosurfactant applications and their importance in fields such as medicine, gene therapy, immunotherapy, antimicrobial bioremediation and agriculture. It also discusses their anti-adhesive properties. The book will appeal to academics and researchers in the field of microbiology, as well as policymakers. It also serves as additional reading material for undergraduate and graduate students of agriculture, ecology, soil science, and environmental sciences.

Biosurfactants are the surface-active biomolecules produced by microorganisms. Biosurfactants have gained commercial significance due to their unique properties, such as high surface activity, high specificity, low toxicity, tolerance to pH, temperature and ionic strength, biodegradability, excellent emulsifying and demulsifying ability, antimicrobial activity, ability to work under extreme conditions, and relative ease of preparation. Biosurfactants are used in several industries, including organic chemicals, petroleum, petrochemicals, mining, metallurgy (mainly bioleaching), agrochemicals, fertilizers, foods, beverages, cosmetics, pharmaceuticals and many others. The aim of this book is to highlight key aspects from basics to advanced concepts, classifications, production and applications in various fields such as agriculture, health, bioremediation, industries, pharmaceutical, oil recovery, environment, and nanotechnology. It also serves as an excellent and expansive literature on fermentation, recovery, genomics, and metagenomics of biosurfactant production. The book focuses on the biosurfactant production from bacteria, the diversity of biosurfactant producing bacteria, and industrial need of biosurfactant.

This new volume offers comprehensive coverage of bacterial biosurfactants, the competitive new area of research that has exciting potential application in agriculture and petroleum exploration. The book helps readers to understand the synthesis of biosurfactants by some specific bacteria, their culture, and extraction toward use in bioremediation and enhanced crude oil recovery. The volume covers the gamut of topics in bacterial biosurfactants in nanostructure, including their comparison to synthetic surfactants, their interaction with microorganisms, and their biochemistry, characterization, genetics of production, bioremedial effects, and more. The volume also explores the myriad uses of bacterial biosurfactants, including in laundry detergents, cosmetics, food production, petroleum, agriculture, medicine and therapeutics, environment, metallurgy, etc. Attention to biosurfactants has been gradually increasing in recent years due to the possibility of their production through fermentation technology and their potential applications in environmental protection. Despite their numerous advantages over synthetic chemical surfactants, biosurfactants have been unable to compete with chemically synthesized surfactants due to high production costs in relation to the inefficient bioprocessing techniques, poor strain productivity, and use of costly substrates. This volume helps to identify the factors that need to be addressed to reduce the cost of production of biosurfactants.

Bio-organic Amendments for Heavy Metal Remediation: Water, soil and plant focuses on these core continuum media to explore remediation options using microbial, organic and combined approached. A volume in the Plant Biology, Sustainability and Climate Change series, this book offers a comprehensive view of techniques and approaches for addressing contamination by heavy metals.As anthropogenic activities increasingly negatively impact natural resources, there has been significant disturbance of water, soil, and plant continuum due to the accumulation of heavy metals. The bioaccumulation of heavy metals in the food chain could pose life-threatening effects on plants as well as humans, and there is need to find effective and sustainable remediation options. The application of bio-organic amendments could serve as a sustainable solution to this problem.Employing microbial, organic and combined approaches to reduce the accumulation of heavy metals in the food chain ultimately would lead to the production of safe food for humans.This book provides a comprehensive view of the challenge with a focus on the bioremediation of heavy metals contamination using ecotechnological approaches to protecting the soil, water and plant continuum. - Highlights remediation techniques/approaches for heavy metals under water, soil and plant continuums - Presents case-studies for real-world insights as well as current practices - Includes regulatory aspects for ensuring safe implementation

Biosurfactants and Sustainability A timely and authoritative collection of resources on the sustainable production of biosurfactants In Biosurfactants and Sustainability, a team of distinguished researchers presents emerging themes in the rapidly evolving field of biosurfactants. The editors have chosen work that focuses on biosurfactants as eco-friendly and versatile compounds of interest in societies seeking sustainable forms of development. The book examines biosurfactants in the context of biorefineries and in the exploration of extremophilic microorganisms for biosurfactant production. The included works discuss biosurfactant production from different lignocellulosic and amylaceous raw materials, as well as oilseeds and other agro-industrial byproducts. Readers will also find: A thorough introduction to microorganisms producing biosurfactants, as well as sustainable biosurfactant production in biorefineries Comprehensive explorations of the challenges of biosurfactant production in fermentation processes Practical discussions of bioreactors and metabolic engineering used in biosurfactant production Fulsome treatments of biosurfactant production using enzyme and novel biosurfactant applications in nanotechnology, health, agriculture, and environmental cleanup Perfect for researchers and professionals with an interest in biosurfactant application and biotechnology processes, Biosurfactants and Sustainability will also benefit academic researchers, industry scientists, and engineers in biotechnology, microbiology, biomass conversion, environmental science and engineering.

This book provides an overview of biosurfactants as biobased compounds, and highlights novel applications in several industries, including biotech, food processing, cosmetic, oil recovery/petroleum, pharmaceutical, detergent and textile. In the past few decades, biosurfactants have emerged as promising alternative surface-active agents to chemical surfactants due to their high biodegradability, low toxicity, multi-functionality under extreme pH and temperature conditions, long-term physicochemical stability, and their production from renewable sources. This book presents the fundamental aspects (classification, structure, genetics, and properties) of biosurfactants and how their features contribute to the global bioeconomy. Chapters from expert contributors discuss the latest screening, purification and characterization methods of new biosurfactants and biosurfactant-producing fungi and bacteria, including extremophiles. Particular attention is given to the role of biosurfactants in the formulation of sustainable agrochemicals, and their application as eco-friendly mosquitocidal agents, and biopesticides. Readers will discover a perspective on the antiviral activity of biosurfactants, in which the latest in vitro and in silico studies are discussed. Readers will also find more about the foremost therapeutic attributes of biosurfactant-mediated nanoparticles as next-generation drug delivery systems. Given its breadth, this book appeals to a wide readership, from students and academic researchers to scientists and professionals from industry, interested in the study and application of microbial surfactants.

This book provides a comprehensive overview of current biosurfactant research and applications. Public awareness of environmental issues has increased significantly over the last decade, a trend that has been accompanied by industry demands for climate-friendly and environmentally friendly renewable raw materials. In the context of household products, biosurfactants could potentially meet this demand in the future due to their low ecotoxicity, excellent biodegradability, and use of renewable raw materials. The diversity of this class of molecules, which has only been marginally tapped to date, offers only an inkling of their future application potential. However, there are two main obstacles to their widespread commercial use on the growing surfactant market: the lack of attractive and competitive production technologies, and the limited structural diversity of commercially available biosurfactants. Addressing both of these core issues, this book will provide readers with a deeper understanding of the role of biosurfactants, including future opportunities and challenges. Chapter “Environmental Impacts of Biosurfactants from a Life Cycle Perspective: A Systematic Literature Review” is available open access under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License via link.springer.com.