Laboratory scale bioreactor studies on the production of l-asparaginase using Rhizopus microsporus IBBL-2 and Trichosporon asahii IBBLA1

l-asparaginase (l-asparagine aminohydrolase, E.C. 3.5.1.1, ASNase) is an enzyme that is used primarily for the production of anti-neoplastic to treat Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia (ALL). Current formulations of the enzyme are highly bacterial in nature which have resulted in adverse reactions. The current paper focusses on production of glutaminase and urease free ASNase in a laboratory scale bioreactor using two fungal species and their efficiency in the scaling up process. The isolated species are Rhizopus microsporus IBBL-2 and Trichosporon asahii IBBLA1 isolated from wheat bran and Antarctic moss respectively. The experiments were conducted under different conditions known as initial, optimized and immobilized. Enzyme activity at these conditions for Rhizopus microsporus IBBL-2 were found to be 10.85, 13.56, 17.18 U mL−1 respectively and for Trichosporon asahii IBBLA1 were found to be 13.97, 19.53, 21.98 U mL−1 respectively in laboratory scale. The consistency of the scale-up data from the shake flask level to the laboratory scale level was found to be greater than 90% efficiency. It was also observed that aeration condition had an impact on the enzyme production with maximum enzyme activity of 13.48 U mL−1 for the Rhizopus microsporus IBBL-2 and 19.95 U mL−1 for Trichosporon asahii IBBLA1 being reported at an aeration rate of 1 Lpm. The above results proved that laboratory scale production of ASNase has shown consistency and efficiency with respect to the flask-scale studies. •The work gives a detailed idea on the efficiency of scale-up process.•Comparative study of microorganism gives the production capabilities.•Different conditions of enzyme production help to identify the best suitable method.•Immobilization of fungal sps. helps in increased and repeated production of enzymes.