Fig. 5.

Influence of inoculum size (a) and cultivation (b) on saccharification of C. thermocellum strain ∆pyrF::KBm. 40 g/L SPS was used as the substrate. a The inoculum size varied from 1% to 300%. b ∆pyrF::KBm was cultivated with a mixture of glucose and SPS with a ratio of 5:0, 1:4, 1:1 or 0:5 as the carbon source. Avicel was used as a control. The saccharification level was calculated by dividing the initial polysaccharides in the substrate (~ 0.89 g/g) with the amount of the obtained reducing sugar, as determined by the DNS method. The inoculum size was 1%. Three independent experiments were performed to calculate the average values and standard errors