@article { ISI:000369937200001,
	title = {Biosurfactant as a promoter of methane hydrate formation: thermodynamic and kinetic studies},
	journal = {Scientific Reports},
	volume = {6},
	year = {2016},
	month = {FEB},
	pages = {20893},
	publisher = {NATURE PUBLISHING GROUP},
	address = {MACMILLAN BUILDING, 4 CRINAN ST, LONDON N1 9XW, ENGLAND},
	abstract = {<p>Natural gas hydrates (NGHs) are solid non-stoichiometric compounds often regarded as a next generation energy source. Successful commercialization of NGH is curtailed by lack of efficient and safe technology for generation, dissociation, storage and transportation. The present work studied the influence of environment compatible biosurfactant on gas hydrate formation. Biosurfactant was produced by Pseudomonas aeruginosa strain A11 and was characterized as rhamnolipids. Purified rhamnolipids reduced the surface tension of water from 72 mN/m to 36 mN/m with Critical Micelle Concentration (CMC) of 70 mg/l. Use of 1000 ppm rhamnolipids solution in C type silica gel bed system increased methane hydrate formation rate by 42.97\% and reduced the induction time of hydrate formation by 22.63\% as compared to water saturated C type silica gel. Presence of rhamnolipids also shifted methane hydrate formation temperature to higher values relative to the system without biosurfactant. Results from thermodynamic and kinetic studies suggest that rhamnolipids can be applied as environment friendly methane hydrate promoter.</p>},
	issn = {2045-2322},
	doi = {10.1038/srep20893},
	author = {Arora, Amit and Cameotra, Swaranjit Singh and Kumar, Rajnish and Balomajumder, Chandrajit and Singh, Anil Kumar and Santhakumari, B. and Kumar, Pushpendra and Laik, Sukumar}
}
@article {43978,
	title = {Biosurfactant surfactin as a kinetic promoter for methane hydrate formation},
	journal = {Energy Procedia},
	volume = {105},
	year = {2017},
	month = {MAY},
	pages = {5011-5017},
	type = {Article},
	abstract = {In the present study, the effect of the biosurfactant Surfactin on methane hydrate formation kinetics was studied. Initially, several marine derived species were screened for the presence of Surfactin. The polymerase chain reaction technique was used as the preliminary screening step for Surfactin which was then followed up by a couple of different assays to provide conclusive evidence of the same. Based on these tests, the D-9 bacterial strain was identified as a producer of Surfactin. Once the presence of Surfactin had been proven, its effect on methane hydrate formation kinetics was investigated upon by carrying out hydrate formation experiments in a stirred tank reactor. The cell free supernatant containing Surfactin was itself used as the hydrate forming solution without any further processing. It was found that the presence of Surfactin in the system greatly enhances hydrate formation kinetics as compared to pure water. In fact the kinetics in presence of Surfactin also surpassed that obtained with 1 wt\% SDS, the most commonly used synthetic kinetic hydrate promoter. This basic study can pave the way for more sophisticated research on the use of biosurfactants as kinetic promoters with a view on rapid methane hydrate formation kinetics for applications such as methane separation, storage and transport.},
	doi = {10.1016/j.egypro.2017.03.1050},
	author = {Bhattacharjee, Gaurav and Barmecha, Vivek and Pradhan, Darshan and Naik, Rajesh and Zare, Kirti and Mawlankar, Rahul R. and Dastager, Syed Gulam and Kushwaha, Omkar Singh and Kumar, Rajnish}
}
