Abstract:Carbon-limited continuous culture was used to study the relationship between the growth of Aspergillus niger and the production of glucoamylase. The result showed that when the specific growth rate was lower than 0.068 h–1, the production of glucoamylase was growth-associated, when the specific growth rate was higher than 0.068 h–1, the production of glucoamylase was not growth-associated. Based on the result of continuous culture, the Monod dynamics model of glucose consumption of A. niger was constructed, Combining Herbert-Pirt equation of glucose and oxygen consumption with Luedeking-Piret equation of enzyme production, the black-box model of Aspergillus niger for enzyme production was established. The exponential fed-batch culture was designed to control the specific growth rate at 0.05 h–1 by using this model and the highest yield for glucoamylase production by A. niger reached 0.127 g glucoamylase/g glucose. The black-box model constructed in this study successfully described the glucoamylase production by A. niger and the result of the model fitted the measured value well. The black-box model could guide the design and optimization of glucoamylase production by A. niger.