SCREENING AND OPTIMIZATION OF CELLULASE PRODUCTION OF BACILLUS STRAINS ISOLATED FROM PHILIPPINE MANGROVES

Two-hundred and twenty-five mangrove bacterial strains previously isolated from several mangrove areas in the Philippines were qualitatively screened for cellulase production and 154 were found to be capable of cellulase production. Among them, ten strains showed very strong positive cellulase activities, which were then quantified. Five with the statistically highest activities, specifically, BBCS-11, BBCS-14, BBoB2L2-2, BOrMGS-2, and BOrMGS-3, including Cellulomonas sp. BIOTECH 1240 (control), were further subjected to partial optimization studies. The effects of substrate, pH, incubation temperature and incubation time on cellulase productoin were determined. The cellulase activities (U mL -1 ) of the strains under optimized conditions were: 54.80 (Control); 56.60 (BBCS-11); 66.50 (BBCS-14); 50.33 (BBoB2L2-2); 51.04 (BOrMGS-2); and 48.70 (BOrMGS-3). The promising cellulase producers were previously identified: BBCS-11 as Bacillus cereus; BBCS-14 as Bacillus licheniformis; BOrMGS-2 and BOrMGS-3 as Bacillus pumilus; and BBoB2L2-2 as Bacillus sp.