Purification and characterization of Inulinase from marine bacterium, <i>Bacillus cereus</i> MU-31

Abstract

Marine bacterium MU-31 strain isolated from sediment of Vellar estuary Parangipettai (Southeast coast of India) was found to secrete a large amount of inulinase into the medium. It was identified as this marine bacterium potent isolated strain was identified as <i>Bacillus cereus</i> by various biochemical studies. Optimum reaction conditions were as follows: temperature, 30<span style="font-family:Symbol; mso-ascii-font-family:" times="" new="" roman";mso-hansi-font-family:"times="" roman";="" mso-char-type:symbol;mso-symbol-font-family:symbol"="" lang="EN-GB">°C; <i>p</i>H, 7.0; NaCl, 2%; substrate concentration, 1.5%; carbon sources, inulin and nitrogen sources, yeast extract. Purified enzyme gave a single band on gel electrophoresis and its molecular weight was estimated to be 66 kDa. Among the different chemicals used, only SDS enhanced the enzyme production and 1,10-phenanthroline was strongly inhibited the inulinase production. Among metal ions, Mg²⁺ stimulated inulinase activity and strongly inhibited by Hg²⁺ and Pb²⁺ at 1mM concentration. All these conditions make <i>Bacillus cereus</i> MU-31 a potential candidate for industrial enzymatic production of high fructose syrup and in other large-scale biotechnological processes.

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