Effect of Physical Pretreatment on Shrimp Waste for the Chitinase Production under Solid State Fermentation by Trichoderma virens

The effect of physical pretreatment and the physical structure of shrimp waste for subsequent use in the production of chitinase were investigated. Physical pretreatment was done using methods of microwave, oven, boiling and sun drying. From the results, it was evident that the structure of the shrimp waste has been affected. Higher chitinase production was found in treated shrimp waste as compared to untreated shrimp waste, due to the configuration changes that allows an increase in chitin’s degradability. The scanning electron microscope (SEM) images showed a marked change in the physical appearance of treated shrimp waste as compared to the untreated shrimp waste, especially with microwave pretreatment. Shrimp waste pretreated with microwave was found to produce higher chitinase’s activity (0.194 U/g IDS) as compared to control (raw shrimp), boiling, oven and sundried pretreatments by increment of 2.9, 1.37, 1.2 and 1.2 fold, respectively.