Effects of oxygen on Propionibacterium shermanii grown in continuous culture

Growth yields, enzyme activities, cytochrome concentrations and the rates of product formation were determined in Propionibacterium shermanii cultures grown in a chemostat with lactate as the energy source at various concentrations of oxygen. Oxygen was toxic when its partial pressure in the inflowing gas was just sufficient to give measurable dissolved oxygen concentration in the culture, when it inhibited lactate oxidation and NADH oxidase activity. Below this oxygen concentration, P. shermanii behaved as a facultative anaerobe. The adaptation from anaerobic metabolism to aerobic metabolism, however, was complex. Low partial pressures of oxygen led to decreased cytochrome and membrane-bound dehydrogenase activities and molar growth yield. Above an oxygen partial pressure of 42 mmHg in the inflowing gas stream, these changes were reversed, leading to an aerobic type of metabolism. At the highest subtoxic concentration of oxygen used (330 mmHg in the input gas), lactate was oxidized mainly to acetate and carbon dioxide and the rate of propionate formation was very low. The high molar growth yield obtained under these conditions suggested that lactate and NADH oxidation via the cytochrome electron transport system was coupled to ATP synthesis.