EVALUATION OF ZEIN-BASED BIOPLASTIC MEMBRANES FOR PROTEIN PURIFICATION

• Main Author: Satya Pratama, Afrizal
• Format: Final Project
• Language: Indonesia
• Online Access: https://digilib.itb.ac.id/gdl/view/87785
• Institution: Institut Teknologi Bandung

Proteins have various uses in enhancing the quality and safety of products in the food industry. One type of protein widely used in the food industry is enzymes. The downstream process of enzyme production is enzyme purification. A common method used in enzyme purification is ultrafiltration membrane technology. However, the use of ultrafiltration (UF) membrane technology for enzyme purification generally employs synthetic polymer-based membranes. Synthetic polymers have low degradability, making them pollutants to the environment. The use of biopolymers is an alternative in enzyme purification using UF membranes. Bovine Serum Albumin (BSA) is a protein widely used as a model enzyme in scientific research. This study uses corn prolamin as a biopolymer for fabricating membranes used for BSA filtration as a model enzyme. The objective of this research is to determine the influence of the operating conditions in the fabrication of corn prolamin-based membranes on the formation of membrane structure. Additionally, this research aims to determine the effect of using corn prolamin-based membranes on the results of BSA filtration. The variations used are the weight composition of corn prolamin with solvent (1:9; 2:8; and 3:7), evaporation time (10-20 seconds), and drying time (1-24 hours). Furthermore, BSA filtration was performed using dead-end filtration with a pressure of 2 bar. The characterization of the morphology of zein-based membranes conducted includes pore diameter measurement using a Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM). Based on the research results, it was found that the higher the concentration of zein used, the lower the porosity level. Longer evaporation times result in smaller pore sizes of the membrane. Longer drying times make the membrane stiffer, but the zein coating has better strength. Additionally, the permeate flux from BSA filtration using zein membranes is greater than that of commercial MF and UF membranes. The rejection values of the membranes have negative values due to the collapse of the zein coating, in contrast to commercial MF and UF membranes.