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The aim of this study was to develop a stable hydrogel carrier system for thyme essential oil (TEO) that could protect its sensitive polyphenol compounds. The impact of wall material (soy protein and alginate) on encapsulation efficiency and thymol release in simulated gastrointestinal conditions, was investigated. The release of thymol was ~ 80 % and 20 % in simulated gastric and pancreatic solutions, respectively. Thyme essential oil plays an important role as an antimicrobial and antioxidant agent. Results indicated that encapsulated TEO inside the hydrogel matrix exhibited antioxidant activity demonstrated by CUPRAC and ABTS analysis, even after thermal treatment of the beads, indicating the metal chelate effect as dominant. In vitro antimicrobial activity of encapsulated TEO has been studied against several pathogenic microorganisms such as Escherichia coli, Staphylococcus aureus, Bacillus cereus and Candida albicans. Beads coded as Ca-A1.5/SP1.5 showed anti-Candida albicans activity, while modified bead formulations Ca-A1.5/SP1.5* and Ca-A1.5/SP0.25** showed bactericidal activity against Escherichia coli and Staphylococcus aureus.

Soy proteins known for their high nutritional value and pronounced techno-functional properties, can be hydrolyzed by using proteolytic enzymes and thus converted into hydrolysates rich in di-, tri- and oligopeptides. The resulting peptides are carriers of valuable biological activities, which make the soy hydrolysates very important in functional food applications as techno-functional and bioactive ingredients. However, commercial incorporation and application of soy protein hydrolysates can be hinderedby their low bioavailability and instability, bitter taste, hygroscopicity and possibility to interact with the food matrix. The aim of this research is encapsulation of the soy protein hydrolysate in liposomes in order to overcome the stated shortcomings, while preserving the biological activities that protein hydrolysates exhibit. The soy hydrolysate was prepared by a two-step enzymatic hydrolysis of a soy protein concentrate using commercial food-grade proteases, endoprotease from Bacillus amyloliquefaciens (Neutrase®) and egzo- and endoprotease from Aspergillus oryzae (Flavourzyme®) and encapsulated within liposomes. The liposomes were produced by a thin film method using a commercial lipid mixture (Phospolipon® 90G) containing mainly phosphatidylcholine. Next, the obtained multilamellar vesicles (MLV) with the soy protein hydrolysate were treated by high-intensity ultrasound waves generated by using (1) an ultrasonic probe at a frequency of 20 kHz and (2) an ultrasonic bath with a frequency 40 kHz. The smallest (310 nm) and uniform (unimodal size distribution) liposomes with the highest efficiency of peptide encapsulation (19 %) were obtained by the probe sonication. The presented results showed that incorporation of the soy protein hydrolysates was achieved within the liposome membrane and caused an increase in the liposome size in all tested formulations, namely: from 297 to 310 nm by using the ultrasonic probe, from 722 to 850 nm by using the ultrasonic bath, while in formulations without the ultrasonic treatments the increase from 2818 to 3464 nm was recorded. The entrapped peptides caused enlargement of all liposomes and the increase in negative charge of zeta potential values, which in the case of MLV liposomes was below -30 mV, indicating high stability of these liposomes. Significant antioxidant activity of the probe-sonicated liposomal formulation was confirmed by the ABTS scavenging ability and iron-chelating activity. Release studies conducted under simulated gastrointestinal conditions confirmed that liposomes provide prolonged release of encapsulated soy protein hydrolysates as compared to diffusion of the free hydrolysate. In the first 75 min, only 20 % of liposome encapsulated soy peptides diffused, which is 2.2-fold lower as compared to the diffusion of the non-encapsulated soy hydrolysate. Liposome encapsulated soy protein hydrolysates may provide the possibility for application in the areas such as food science and technology, with the aim to enhance the nutritional value and shelf life of food products, and develop functional foods.

Magnetic particles (MAG), obtained by standard procedure of coprecipitation of Fe2+and Fe3+ in an excess of ammonia, and polyaniline modified magnetic particles MAG-PANI were used as carriers for immobilization of α-amylase from Bacillus licheniformis. The formation of a polyaniline layer (PANI) on MAG particles was achieved by chemical polymerization of aniline. Immobilization was carried out by adsorption, as a simple, inexpensive and fast method that allows retention of a large portion of the initial activity of the immobilized enzyme. FTIR spectroscopy was used to characterize the obtained particles and to confirm changes dueto formation of a PANI layer and conjugation of α-amylase on the particle surfaces. Particle size distribution was bimodal and three-modal for MAG and MAG-PANI, respectively. Appearance of a fraction of smaller MAG-PANI particles than MAG particles could be attributed to the formation of PANI particles without the MAG core. Measured values of Zeta potential for MAG-PANI were higher as compared to MAG indicating stabilization of particles in the presence of PANI. Relevant kinetic parameters for immobilized enzyme were determined from the Hanes plot. The apparent Km constant was 1.91 and 1.48 g L–1 for MAG-A and MAG-PANI-A, respectively, while 􀜸m was 0.19 g L–1 min–1 for MAG and 0.32 g L–1 min–1 for MAG-PANI. The obtained values of Km indicated that modification of MAG by PANI enhanced kinetic properties of the immobilized enzyme. Moreover, the modification of MAG by PANI showed the increase in both pH and thermal stabilities of the immobilized enzyme. Studies of the operational activity of the immobilized enzyme on MAG-PANI have shown that 98.8% of starch was hydrolyzed over 20.0 min. In the first cycle in the packed bed reactor operated in a recycling mode, but approximately five times longer period was required to hydrolyze 93.5 of starch in the fifth cycle. In the continuous packed bed reactor without recycling, the degree of starch hydrolysis was not changed significantly during 4 h and was 88.8±1.6%, whereas the half-life of the biocatalyst was 6.2 h. Although coating MAG particles with a polyaniline offers many advantages, the main disadvantage is possible appearance of residues of aniline monomers and dimmers. The potential toxicity of these residues requires precise composition analysis of the product of starch hydrolysis catalyzed by α-amylase adsorbed onto MAG-PANI. [Project of the Serbian Ministry of Education, Science and Technological Development, Grant no. III 46010]

The problem of environmental pollution day by day becomes more worrisome, primarily due to the large amounts of wastewater contaminated with various harmful organic compounds, discharged into the environment untreated or partially clean. Feasibility of use of horseradish peroxidase (Amoracia rusticana) in the synthetic dyes decolorization was approved by many researchers. Among a number of supports used for the immobilization, it was found that natural clay, kaolin has excellent features which are a precondition for obtaining biocatalysts with the excellent performances. For this reason, a horseradish peroxidase was immobilized onto kaolin using glutaraldehyde as a cross-linking agent. Obtained biocatalyst was applied in the decolorization of anthraquinone dye C. I. Acid Violet 109. Under determined optimal conditions (pH 4.0, hydrogen peroxide concentration 0.6 mM, dye concentration 30 mg L-1, temperature 24ºC) around 76 % of dye decolorization was achieved. Reusability study showed that resulting biocatalyst was possible to apply four times in the desired reaction with relatively high decolorization percentage. [Projekat Ministarstva nauke Republike Srbije, br. III-46010 i br. 172013]

The production of bioactive peptides from egg white proteins (EWPs) and their separation are emerging areas with many new applications. The objective of this study was to compare antioxidant activity of three distinct EWP hydrolysates and their peptide fractions prepared by membrane ultrafiltration using membranes with 30, 10 and 1 kDa molecular weight cut-off. The hydrolysates were obtained by thermal and ultrasound pretreated EWPs hydrolyzed with a bacterial protease, Alcalase. It appeared that the pretreatment significantly affected peptide profiles and antioxidant activity of the hydrolysates measured by ABTS, DPPH and FRAP methods. The hydrolysate prepared using Alcalase and ultrasound pretreatment at 40 kHz - 15 min has shown to be the most effective in scavenging both DPPH and ABTS radicals (28.10±1.38 and 79.44±2.31%, respectively). It has been noticed that this hydrolysate had a nutritionally more adequate peptide profile than the other hydrolysates with a much lower amount of peptides

Alpha-lipoic acidis an organosulphur compound well-known for its therapeutic potential and antioxidant properties. However, the effective use of α-lipoic acid depends on biological plasma half-life and its preserving stability, which could be improved by encapsulation. In this study, α-lipoic acid was incorporated into chitosan microparticles obtained by reverse emulsion crosslinking technique, as well as into microparticles of alginate/gelatin crosslinked with zinc ions. Encapsulation of α-lipoic acid in both cases was carried out by swelling of synthesized dried microparticles by their dipping in a solution of the active substance under strictly controlled conditions. Encapsulation efficiency of α-lipoic acid obtained in this study was up to 53.9 %. The structural interaction of α-lipoic acid with the carriers was revealed by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy. In vitro released studies showed that controlled release of α-lipoic acid was achieved through its encapsulation into chitosan microparticles. The results of in vitro antioxidative activity assays of released α-lipoic acid indicated that antioxidant activity was preserved at a satisfactory level. These obtained results suggested that chitosan microparticles could be suitable for modeling the controlled release of α-lipoic acid. [Projekat Ministartsva nauke Republike Srbije, br. III 46010 i br. III46001]

The aim of this study was to evaluate and compare the antimicrobial activity of four essential oils that belong to Lamiaceae family (sage, oregano, thyme) and eucalyptus oil. Gas chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry (GC-MS) revealed that the highest percent of essential oils 98.93% include three classes of compounds - monoterpene hydrocarbons, aromatic hydrocarbons and oxidized monoterpenes. The main components are oxidized monoterpenes: carvacrol (59.03%); thymol (36.12%), eucalyptol (20.66%), hydrocarbon monoterpenes: limonene (30.96%) and α-pinene (12.21%) and aromatic monoterpene, p-cymene (22.25%) All essential oils showed great potential of antimicrobial activity against several bacteria and yeast C. albicans, using the agar diffusion method with wells. Minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) for the essential oils has been determined by the broth dilution method and valued in the range from 1 to 5 μL/m, depending on the essential oil and bacteria tested, and up to 100 μL/ml for C. albicans. The essential oils of Lamiaceae family exhibited a strong antibacterial activity for tested microorganisms, while the essential oils of thyme were especially recognized.

3-Cyano-4-ethoxymethyl-6-methyl-2-pyridone is an important precursor in the synthesis of vitamin B6, obtained in the addition reaction between 2-cyanoacetamide and 1-ethoxy-2,4-pentanedione catalyzed by lipase from Candida rugosa (triacylglycerol ester hydrolases, EC 3.1.1.3). This work shows new experimental data and mathematical modeling of lipase catalyzed synthesis of 3-cyano-4-ethoxymethyl-6-methyl-2-pyridone, starting from 1-ethoxy-2,4-pentanedione and 2-cyanoacetamide. Kinetic measurements were done at 50 oC with enzyme concentration of 1.2 % w/v. Experimental results were fitted with two kinetic models: the ordered bi-ter and ping-pong bi-ter model, and the initial rates of the reaction were found to correlate best with a ping-pong bi-ter mechanism with inhibition by 2-cyanoacetamide. Obtained specificity constants indicated that lipase from C. rugosa had higher affinity towards 1-ethoxy-2,4-pentanedione and less bulky substrates. [Projekat Ministarstva nauke Republike Srbije, br. 172013, br. III 46010 and br. 172049]

Pseudomonas aeruginosa was repeatedly reported as powerful producer of rhamnolipid biosurfactants as well as producer of hydrolytic enzymes. In this study effects of four fermentation factors were evaluated using response surface methodology and experiments were performed in accordance with a four-factor and five-level central composite experimental design. Investigated factors were: fermentation temperature, time of fermentation, concentration of sunflower oil and concentration of Tween® 80. The most important finding was that regression coefficients of the highest values were those that describe interactions between factors and that they differ for lipase and rhamnolipid production, which were both investigated in this study. Production of both metabolites was optimized and response equations were obtained, making it possible to predict rhamnolipid concentration or lipase activity from known values of the four factors. The highest achieved rhamnolipid concentration and lipase activity were 138 mg dm-3 (sunflower oil concentration 0.8 %, Tween® 80 concentration 0.05 %, temperature 30°C, and fermentation time 72 h) and 11111 IU dm-3(sunflower concentration of 0.4 %, Tween® 80 concentration of 0.05 %, temperature of 30°C, and fermentation time of 120 h), respectively. [Projekat Ministarstva nauke Republike Srbije, br. E!6750 and br. III 46010]

In this study solid and liquid wastes from the olive oil processing industry were evaluated as substrates for Yarrowia lipolytica growth with the aim of lipase production. Olive mill wastewater and olive oil cake seemed to provide necessary nutrients and physical support for the yeast to grow and produce enzyme. The highest lipolytic activity of 850 IU dm-3 was achieved after 4 days of submerged cultivation in supplemented olive mill wastewater. In addition, olive oil cake appeared to be a convenient substrate for lipase production under solid state fermentation mode. Lipase production was further improved by media supplementation and/or change in physical settings of the experiment. However, the most significant improvement of lipase production under solid state fermentation was achieved by an alkaline treatment of the substrate (more than 10-fold) when the amount of produced lipase reached up to ~40 IU g-1 of substrate. [Projekat Ministarstva nauke Republike Srbije, br. E!6750 i br. III 46010]

Fatty acid ascorbyl esters are liposoluble substances that possess good antioxidative properties. These compounds could be synthesized by using various acyl donors for acylation of vitamin C in reaction catalyzed by chemical means or lipases. Enzymatic process is preferred since it is regioselective, performed under mild reaction conditions, with the obtained product being environmentally friendly. Polar organic solvents, ionic liquids, and supercritical fluids has been successfully used as a reaction medium, since commonly used solvents with high Log P values are inapplicable due to ascorbic acid high polarity. Acylation of vitamin C using fatty acids, their methyl-, ethyl-, and vinyl esters, as well as triglycerides has been performed, whereas application of the activated acyl donors enabled higher molar conversions. In each case, majority of authors reported that using excessive amount of the acyl donor had positive effect on yield of product. Furthermore, several strategies have been employed for shifting the equilibrium towards the product by water content control. These include adjusting the initial water activity by pre-equilibration of reaction mixture, enzyme preparation with water vapor of saturated salt solutions, and the removal of formed water by the addition of molecular sieves or salt hydrate pairs. The aim of this article is to provide a brief overview of the procedures described so far for the lipase-catalyzed synthesis of fatty acid ascorbyl esters with emphasis on the potential application in food, cosmetics, and pharmaceutics. Furthermore, it has been pointed out that the main obstacles for process commercialization are long reaction times, lack of adequate purification methods, and high costs of lipases. Thus, future challenges in this area are testing new catalysts, developing continuous processes for esters production, finding cheaper acyl donors and reaction mediums, as well as identifying standard procedures for purification of products which will not require consumption of large amounts of non-biocompatible organic solvents.

The objectives of this study were to examine the effect of sonication and high-pressure carbon dioxide processing on proteolytic hydrolysis of egg white proteins and antioxidant activity of the obtained hydrolysates. It appeared that the ultrasound pretreatment resulted in an increase in the degree of hydrolysis of the enzymatic reaction while the high-pressure carbon dioxide processing showed an inhibition effect on the enzymatic hydrolysis of egg white proteins to some extent. The antioxidant activity of the obtained hydrolysates was improved by ultrasound pretreatment of egg white proteins at the pH 8.3. Thus, the combination of ultrasound pretreatment at the pH 8.3 and subsequent enzymatic hydrolysis with alcalase at 50°C and pH 8.0 could offer a new approach to the improvement of the functional properties of egg white proteins and their biological activity. [Projekat Ministarstva nauke Republike Srbije, br. E!6750]

This study is concerned with the partitioning of cellulolytic activity in the polyethylene glycol/dextran two-phase systems. In the system of 10% (w/w) polyethylene glycol 1500/5% (w/w) dextran 500,000/80% (w/w) crude enzyme at the pH 5, 100%, yield of cellulolytic activity from Penicillium sp. in the top phase was achieved in a single extraction step. Addition of KH2PO4 to this system at a concentration of 15 mmol/L improved the purification factor in the top phase for cellulolytic activity from crude preparation to a value of 2.6, although it had an adverse effect on the yield in the same phase. [Projekat Ministarstva nauke Republike Srbije, br. 46010]

Lipases are very efficient biocatalysts with wide application in synthesis of important ingredients of food, cosmetics and pharmaceutical products, due to their capacity to catalyze both, ester synthesis and ester hydrolysis. The preparation of stable and active immobilized derivatives of lipases is necessity for their application in industrial enzymatic processes. In this work, the optimization of lipase from C. rugosa immobilization by microwave irradiation was performed, since it was previously reported that immobilization process can be drastically accelerated by means of microwave irradiation, even resulting with slight increase of lipase activity. Eupergit®, commercial support with active epoxy groups, was used as immobilization support. In first stage of our study, the immobilization time and ionic strength of immobilization buffer were optimized. It was found out that the highest immobilized activity can be achieved at high ionic strengths (1 M buffer) after 3 min, while further increase of immobilization time led to decrease of lipase activity. Then, the immobilized derivative obtained at optimum conditions was applied in synthesis of amyl isobutyrate in organic solvent. Key reaction factors (temperature, water concentration, immobilized lipase concentration, and substrate molar ratio) were optimized using response surface methodology. The substrate conversion higher above 85% was achieved in our study. The statistical analysis revealed that each of analyzed factors had significant effect on yield of ester, with initial enzyme concentration and substrate molar ratio being the most prominent factors. The second-order regression model that describes the effect of all four factors on substrate conversion was established. The optimum values of factors were: temperature 50ºC, initial immobilized enzyme concentration 220 mg ml-1, added water concentration 0.1% (v/v), and molar ratio acid/alcohol 2.5.

To overcome the problems of free enzyme application as catalysts in chemical reactions, i.e. high costs of isolation and purification processes, high sensitivity to process conditions, insufficient enzyme stability etc., a different immobilization techniques are to be used. Immobilization to/within solid support improves enzyme stability decreasing its denaturation. This paper deals with hydrogels of N-isopropylacrylamide and itaconic acid with incorporated nonionic surfactants (Triton X-100, Brij 30 and Tween 80) synthesized in distilled water at room temperature by free radical polymerization. These hydrogels were used as supports for immobilization of enzyme, lipase from Candida rugosa by post-entrapment method. The aim was to investigate the effect of the nonionic surfactants on the lipase binding capacity, as well as on its hydrolytic activity. In order to characterize the obtained hydrogels FT-IR analysis has been performed. Further, the swelling behaviour of these samples in buffer solution of pH 6.80 has been investigated. The dynamic - mechanical properties of hydrogels and detailed have been studied, too. The immobilized lipase showed somewhat reduced hydrolytic activity, as compared to the activity of free lipase as well as in comparison to the lipase immobilized to the reference sample (sample synthesized under the same polymerization conditions, but in the absence of surfactants). It was concluded that the addition of surfactants increased the hydrogel mesh size. The surfactant addition did not affect the dynamic - mechanical properties of the investigated hydrogels. The largest percentage of specific activity and yield of activity were presented by the reference sample, too. It is obvious that the absence of surfactants charged groups has no influence on the lipase binding capacity, and the obtained activity yields are to be expected.

The discovery of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) has opened a new door in nanotechnology. With their high surface area, unique electronic, thermal and mechanical properties, CNTs have been widely used as carriers for protein immobilization. In fact, carbon nanotubes present ideal support system without diffusional limitations, and also have the possibility of surface covalent functionalization. It is usually the oxidation process that introduces carboxylic acid groups. Enzymes and other proteins could be adsorbed or covalently attached onto carbon nanotubes. Adsorption of enzyme is a very simple and inexpensive immobilization method and there are no chemical changes of the protein. It has also been found that this technique does not alter structure and unique properties of nanotubes. However, a major problem in process designing is relatively low stability of immobilized protein and desorption from the carrier. On the other hand, while covalent immobilization provides durable attachment the oxidation process can reduce mechanical and electronic properties of carbon nanotubes. It can also affect the active site of enzyme and cause the loss of enzyme activity. Bioimmobilization studies have showed that there are strong interactions between carbon nanotubes surface and protein. The retention of enzyme structure and activity is critical for their application and it is of fundamental interest to understand the nature of these interactions. Atomic force microscopy (AFM), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and circular dichroism (CD) spectroscopy provide an insight into the structural changes that occur during the immobilization. The aim of this paper is to summarize progress of protein immobilization onto carbon nanotubes.

Penicillin acylase (PAC) is an important industrial enzyme for the production of many β-lactam antibiotics. It is capable of catalyzing the hydrolysis of penicillin G (Pen G) to generate phenylacetic acid (PAA) and 6-aminopenicillanic acid (6-APA). In this paper, in order to prevent enzyme inactivation, an attempt of coupling enzyme modification and immobilization was presented. Chemical modification was promoted to introduce carbohydrate moiety into the PAC molecule, capable of being covalently linked to an amino support. This seems to provide a possibility to couple the enzyme without risking a reaction at the active site which might cause a loss of activity. PAC molecules were modified by cross-linking with polyaldehyde derivatives of alginate in order to add them new and useful functions. Immobilization of alginate-PAC on Sepabeads EC-HA was used as a model system in order to demonstrate the potential of this strategy. Optimal conditions for covalent immobilization of alginate-PAC from Escherichia coli on support Sepabeads EC-HA, were investigated. The immobilized enzyme was then characterized by evaluating the potential effects of immobilization on its thermal stability, temperature and pH profile in comparison with native non-modified PAC and modified non-immobilized PAC. The maximum amount of the alginate-PAC coupled on the dry support of 99 mg/g was satisfactory. Deactivation rate constants at 50 ºC for free PAC, alginate-PAC and alginate-PAC immobilized on Sepabeads EC-HA were 2,32; 50,65 and 1,68 h-1, respectively. Alginate-PAC and alginate-PAC immobilized on Sepabeads EC-HA had the same pH and temperature optimum as the native non-modified PAC.

Lipases can be used for a variety of biotechnological applications: synthesis of fine chemicals, therapeutics, agrochemicals, cosmetics, flavors, biopolymers and biodiesel. Biodiesel is an alternative fuel for diesel engines that is environmentally acceptable. Conventionally, biodiesel is produced by transesterification of triglycerides and short chain alcohols in the presence of an acid or an alkaline catalyst. There are several problems associated with this kind of production that can be resolved by using lipase as the biocatalyst. The usage of lipases has several advantages over the conventional chemical methods. It is considered as less energy intensive and environmentally friendly. However, there are two main obstacles associated with the effective utilization of lipases in the production of biodiesel. The main one is the cost of the enzyme and its poor stability in the presence of excess alcohol. Several strategies are proposed to overcome these drawbacks: immobilization of lipases, stepwise addition of alcohol, and the usage of novel acyl acceptors and the usage of whole cell biocatalysts.

Monoacylglycerols are non-ionic surfactants widely used in the food industry. They are also important in cosmetic and pharmaceutical industries as drug carriers and for the consistency improvements in creams and lotions. Current process for their production is based on the glycerolysis of natural fats and oils in the presence of inorganic catalysts at temperatures higher than 220 oC. The major drawbacks of this process include high-energy consumption, low yield, and poor product quality. The use of lipases for the monoacylglycerols production offers environmental advantages and a reduction in energy consumption. Besides, the same surfactants prepared by the enzymatic synthesis may be labeled as “natural”. Recent progress in the application of highly-stable lipases in the organic solvents offers the possibility of employing various methods to the enzyme-catalyzed synthesis of monoacylglycerols, such as selective hydrolysis of fats and oils using 1,3-regiospecific lipases, the esterification of glycerol with fatty acids and the glycerolysis of fats or oils. In this review, different reaction systems such as aqueous-organic two-phase systems, microemulsions and reverse micelles systems, anhydrous organic solvents, solvent-free systems with free or immobilized lipases, as well as the use of two-phase membrane reactor systems are presented. We discuss some of the key factors, such as the control of water content, removing of the products from reaction system, and the effects of solvent on the lipase activity and selectivity, that must be addressed in order to obtain an efficient reaction system with high yields of monoacylglycerols. Engineering of the enzymatic monoacylglycerols synthesis processes requires also optimization of other factors as: molar ratio of substrates, temperature, type of lipase immobilization and supports (if any), reactor design and operating regime.

The importance of vitamin B6 has been known since its discovery in the 1940's. Chemical tests, elestrometric titration determinations, and absorption spectrum studies showed that this vitamin exists in three major chemical forms: pyridoxine (an alcohol), pyridoxal (an aldehyde), and pyridoxamine (a primary amine). Vitamin B6 is needed for more than 100 enzymes involved in protein metabolism, and it is assumed that this vitamin is cofactor of metabolic processes more important than any other substance. A deficiency of vitamin B6 in the human diet leads to severe disorders. Vitamin B6 is necessary for the proper function of the immune and nervous system, and helps the body convert protein to energy. This paper describes the history, properties and applications of vitamin B6, elucidation of chemical structure, and different procedures for synthesis of pyridoxine and pyridoxamine.

Enzymes produced by indigenous Pseudomonas aeruginosa strain have been subjected to research considering their potential application as detergent additives. As previously noted, lipase produced by Pseudomonas aeruginosa is highly alkaline, thermostable and solvent tolerant. Furthermore, same strain exhibits both lipase and protease activity establishing this lipase as potentially desirable component of enzyme-containing detergents. Further research was carried out to investigate insusceptibility of this lipase against coexisting native protease, several commercial surfactants, oxidizing agents and commercial detergents. Lipases and proteases remained highly active when incubated with several different surfactants and oxidizing agents under washing conditions. Moreover, presence of surfactants and oxidizing agents such as Tween® 20 and Triton® X-100 initially augment lipase and protease activity. Additionally, crude lipase preparation was insusceptible to coexisting native protease hence indicating possible storage stability. Overall, the remarkable properties of these enzymes make them potential detergent additives.

The application of lipases as catalysts in chemical reactions has been deterred by the high cost of isolation and purification of enzymes, the instability of their structure when they are isolated from their natural environment, contamination of products with residual protein, their sensitivity to process conditions, etc. These problems could be overcome using immobilized lipases. Immobilization is achieved by fixing enzymes to or within solid supports and as a result a heterogeneous system is obtained. The present paper reports on the immobilization of Candida rugosa lipase in hydrogels based on N-isopropylacrylamide and itaconic acid. Immobilization of lipase is carried out by two different methods. In the first method, lipase is added to the reaction mixture before polymerization and crosslinking (in situ polymerization), while in the second method the synthetized hydrogels are immersed in lipase solution and left to rich the equilibrium swelling. The specific activities of the immobilized lipase were determined in both cases and compared. The amount of the immobilized lipase is higher if the immobilization is carried out by immersing hydrogel in lipase solution. It was observed that in both cases lipase activity increases with an increase of the itaconic acid content up to 10 wt% and thereafter decreases. From the measurements of shear storage moduli (G') it was concluded that the increase of the itaconic acid content decreases the mechanical properties of the hydrogels. SEM analysis confirmed the highly porous structure of hydrogels. It was found that greater pores were achieved when the enzyme was immobilized by in situ polymerization. When the enzyme was immobilized by in situ polymerization the itaconic acid content had not great effect on the mass of the immobilized enzyme, except for the 100/0 sample. On the contrary, for the samples where the enzyme was immobilized by swelling, the increase of the itaconic acid content increases the mass of the immobilized enzyme. Concerning the activity of the immobilized lipase, the swelling degree and mechanical properties of the investigated hydrogels, the best results were performed by the 95/5 hydrogel sample.

The object of the study was to investigate the process conditions relevant for the pentyl octanoate production with the lipase from Candida rugosa immobilized on Sepabeads EC-EP carrier. This is an epoxide-containing commercial polymethacrylic carrier with suitable characteristics for enzyme immobilization. The immobilized lipase suitable for pentyl octanoate synthesis has been prepared by a direct lipase binding to polymers via their epoxide groups. The enzymatic activity was determined by both hydrolysis of olive oil in an aqueous system and esterification of n-pentanol with octanoic acid in a low aqueous system. The influence of several important reaction parameters such as temperature, initial water content, initial substrate molar ratio, enzyme loading and time of adding of molecular sieves in the system is carefully analyzed by means of an experimental design. Production of the ester was optimized and an ester production response equation was obtained, making it possible to predict ester yields from known values of the five main factors. Almost complete conversion (>99%) of the substrate to ester could be realized, using lipase loading as low as 37 mg/g dry support and in a relatively short time (24 h) at 45ºC, when high initial substrate molar ratio of 2.2 is used.