Production, Characterization and Evaluation of Bacterial Protease as a Potential Additive to Enhance Detergency of Endod

摘要

At present alkaline proteases are widely used in the detergent, leather tanning, pharmaceutical, food, and feed processing industries. Although proteases are found in all living organisms (plant, animal, and microorganisms), the bulk of commercially important enzymes are from microorganisms. The aim of this study was to isolate protease producing bacteria, characterize the enzyme, and evaluate potential application as detergent additive to enhance the washing performance of endod berries. Different bacterial strains were isolated from soil and screened using an alkaline casein agar media. One isolate designated as aau 2106 was selected for further study because of its high proteoliytic activity, level of enzyme production and, ability to grow under solid state fermentation (SSF). Cultivation condition for the production of the enzyme under SSF, such as, moisture content, nitrogen content, and incubation period were optimized. The enzyme was active in the pH range of 6 to 10.5, temperature of 40 to 75. And optimum in; 96h incubation period, 1:1 ratio of moisture content and, casein in the production of enzyme under SSF and the enzyme was stable in the presence of endod and commercial detergents. The potential of the enzyme as a detergent additive was tested by adding the protease (57 U/g) in detergent formulations and used to clean pieces of cloth stained with blood and egg. Addition of the enzyme improved the cleaning efficiency of both endod and commercial detergents. This indicates that enzyme supplementation of endod could result in the development of an ecofriendly detergent.