Acetone–butanol–ethanol fermentation

Acetone–butanol–ethanol (ABE) fermentation is a process that uses bacterial fermentation to produce acetone, n-Butanol, and ethanol from carbohydrates such as starch and glucose. It was developed by the chemist Chaim Weizmann and was the primary process used to make acetone during World War I, such as to produce cordite, a substance essential for the British war industry.

The process may be likened to how yeast ferments sugars to produce ethanol for wine, beer, or fuel, but the organisms that carry out the ABE fermentation are strictly (obligate anaerobes). The ABE fermentation produces solvents in a ratio of 3 parts acetone, 6 parts butanol to 1 part ethanol. It usually uses a strain of bacteria from the Class Clostridia (Family Clostridiaceae). Clostridium acetobutylicum is the most well-studied and widely used species, although Clostridium beijerinckii has also been used with good results.

For gas stripping, the most common gases used are the off-gases from the fermentation itself, a mixture of carbon dioxide and hydrogen gas.

The production of butanol by biological means was first performed by Louis Pasteur in 1861.

In 1905, Austrian biochemist Franz Schardinger found that acetone could similarly be produced.

In 1910 Auguste Fernbach (1860-1939) developed a bacterial fermentation process using potato starch as a feedstock in the production of butanol.

Industrial exploitation of ABE fermentation started in 1916, during World War I, with Chaim Weizmann's isolation of Clostridium acetobutylicum, as described in U.S. patent 1315585.

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