Location of xylanolytic enzymes in Chaetomium globosum

✍ Scribed by Jagruti P. Gandhi; Dr. K. Koteshwara Rao

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 1997
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 409 KB
• Volume: 37
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0233-111X
• DOI: 10.1002/jobm.3620370202

✦ Synopsis

Localisation of endo p-1 -4-xylan xylanohydrolase and p-xylosidase was studied in Chaetomium globosum when the fungus was grown on 1 % (w/v) birchwood xylan. Although both enzymes are present in the soluble fraction of the cell, xylanase activity was membrane bound whereas B-xylosidase activity was associated with the cell wall. Xylanase andp-xylosidase acted synergistically on the xylan backbone with the appearance of xylo-oligosaccharides, xylobiose and xylose.

Chuetomium globosum is an ascomycete fungus that is capable of utilizing both untreated cellulosic and lignocellulosic substrates as the sole source of carbon. This suggests that the fungus secretes both cellulases and hemicellulases. These enzymes play an important role in both fungal nutrition and the invasion of higher plant tissues containing lignocellulose. Several reports are available on the localization of cellulases in fungi (MAC DONALD et al. 1984 whereas there are no reports on the location of xylanolytic enzymes. The present investigation reports on the location of xylanase (EC.3.2.1.8) and /3-xylosidase (EC.3.2.1.37) in C. globosum. This information can be exploited for the possible use of immobilized whole cell mycelia for xylose production from heteroxylooligosaccharides (UCHIDA et al. 1992).