Enhancing the recovery of volatile fatty acids from strawberry extrudate through anaerobic fermentation at different pH values Cubero Cardoso, Juan Serrano Moral, Antonio Strawberry extrudate Volatile fatty acids Anaerobic digestion Fermentation Methane The authors are very grateful to the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation for funding this research through the project PID2020-116698RB-100. Antonio Serrano is grateful to the Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation, and Universities for his Juan de la Cierva-Incorporacion fellowship (IJC2019-040933-I) and to the Economic Transformation, Industry, Knowledge and Universities Department of the Andalucia Autonomous Government for his Emergia fellowship (EMERGIA20_00114). The authors are grateful to the Regional Government of Andalusia, Junta de Andalucia, Consejeria de Economia y Conocimiento (Project UHU-1257728), for providing additional financial support. Funding for open access charge: Universidad de Granada/CBUA. The authors also wish to express their gratitude to Javier Ramiro-Garcia and Ainoa Botana Samper for their assistance with this research. Strawberry extrudate (SE) is a by-product derived from the elaboration of strawberrytasted products. Adequate management of this substrate would entail a new source of benefit for the berry sector, instead of a costly waste to be treated. The aim of this work is to assess the potential use of SE as a carbon soured for volatile fatty acids (VFA) production through anaerobic fermentation at controlled pH (5, and 9) and without pH control (operational pH around 7). Anaerobic digestion at pH 7 resulted in a negligible accumulation of VFA, being mainly degraded to methane. The operation at the other pHs resulted in a marked drop in methane production and, thus, the accumulation of VFA. At pH 9, around 50% of the fed CODtot (total chemical oxygen demand) was accumulated as VFA. Acetic acid represented 61% of these total VFA. The operation at pH 5 resulted in a lower VFA accumulation, i.e. 15% fed CODtot, although the VFA profile was more complex than at pH 9. Propionic and butyric acids represented 43% and 32%, respectively, of the total VFA accumulated at pH 5. 2022-05-31T07:30:23Z 2022-05-31T07:30:23Z 2022-04-25 journal article Juan Cubero-Cardoso... [et al.]. Enhancing the recovery of volatile fatty acids from strawberry extrudate through anaerobic fermentation at different pH values, Environmental Technology & Innovation, Volume 28, 2022, 102587, ISSN 2352-1864, [https://doi.org/10.1016/j.eti.2022.102587] http://hdl.handle.net/10481/75123 10.1016/j.eti.2022.102587 eng http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/es/ open access Atribución-NoComercial-SinDerivadas 3.0 España Elsevier