Wealth from waste – beef extract for microbiological media from tannery solid waste

Lime fleshing waste is one of the major hazardous solid wastes from leather industry. Utilization of the waste is one of the appropriate strategies to address the environmental issues and to realize economical returns. A process of preparation of beef extract from limed fleshing waste has been developed. The beef extract prepared is intended for microbial application. According to the process developed, the alkalis present in the fleshing waste were neutralized and removed by washing. Then the fleshing waste was hydrolyzed thermally and the hydrolysate obtained was lyophilized. The prepared product was characterized. The characteristics of the prepared product were compared with those of a widely accepted market product (Hi-Media). The beef extract prepared was found to be in compliance with all the requirements of the relevant standard. The product was also found to perform similarly to Hi-Media beef extract. The chemistry of the product was studied using tools such as FT-IR, HPLC, Maldi-TOF, 13C NMR and 1H NMR. The product chemistry was found to be akin to that of the beef extract of Hi-Media.