Natural by-product of agricultural waste can be turned into products of commercial interest. Much effort from scientists and researchers all around the world has been put to extend the full use of agricultural waste. Reports on keratinise enzyme production from the bioconversion of keratinous materials has much been made. However there is still much space to find the most suitable conditions. Keratinolytic microorganisms have a great importance in poultry waste degradation and its bioconversion to compost or animal feed. The goal of the study was to investigate the keratinase enzyme production ability of bacterial strain against keratinous bio waste like chicken feather at environmental parameters of pH (7), temperature (37oC) and incubation period (24-120h). Keratinase enzyme production was studied using submerged fermentation. Production of keratinase enzyme was analysed by protease and keratinase assays. In the keratinase method, maximum enzyme production of 95 IU/ml was achieved at temperature of 37oC by Bacillus sp. in feather keratin with pH of 7.0 at 72 hr. Statistical optimization increased the keratinase production by eight fold. The organism was identified as Bacilluscereus which showed potent efficiency in feather degradation and its partial purification was done.

Keywords : Degradation, Response surface methodology, Box-Behnken, Fermentation, Fractional factorial, Statistics.