Abstract
Succinic acid was a building block chemical of many industrial products, among these, one of the most interesting applications concerns the bioplastics market. This compound can be produced through the biotechnological routes, but several challenges still need to be addressed. One of the greatest challenges has been the downstream process to recover and purify succinic acid from the fermentative broth. Succinic acid must be taken from the fermentation broth, that was composed of various compounds, such as cellular residues, proteins, and other acids, to reach a recovery and a purity >90%, in order to be marketed. Generally, the downstream process can be divided into three phases: pretreatment, separation and purification. Several studies have been carried out on different technologies with the aim to improve recovery and purity. To date, all these methods were applied only on laboratory-scale, due to various critical issues that emerged, such as high costs, which prevented their application on an industrial scale. This review highlighted the best obtained results from the recent studies and discussed on critical aspects and future perspectives on the topic.
