Patent ID: 8231921

Claim:
A process for preparing a low acyl gellan gum comprising the steps of: a. fermenting a PHB-deficient strain of Sphingomonas elodea in a fermentation broth; b. clarifying the fermentation broth by a chemical/enzymatic process comprising the steps of: i. heating the fermentation broth to a temperature from about 30° C. to about 70° C.; ii. treating the fermentation broth with one or more antioxidants in combination with one or more chelating agents and a lysozyme enzyme; iii. treating the fermentation broth of step ii with one or more surfactants; and iv. treating the fermentation broth of step iii with a protease enzyme to obtain a clarified fermentation broth; c. deacylating the clarified fermentation broth with a caustic agent to obtain a gellan gum having a total acyl content of 2.0% or less; and d. precipitating the gellan gum from the fermentation broth; wherein the precipitated gellan gum has a 0.2% gellan gum curdmeter gel strength of at least about 300 g/cm 2 .