Authors : Motwani D.R. , Meshram V.G. and Jambhulkar V.S.
Page Nos : 335-342
Description :
The economic and ecological function of pectinase enzymes in industries is gaining much attention with the need of highly productive strains of fungus to reduce production cost. The present investigation is a comparative evaluation of Aspergillus species. polygalacturonase. The three fungal isolates isolated from agro-waste, Aspergillus niger, Aspergillus flavus and Aspergillus fumigates showed polygalacturonase very high polygalacturonase activity with polygalacturonic acid as the substrate. The three isolates also showed varying higest degree activity towards citrus peel as compared to other substrate. The effect of temperature on the polygalacturonase of the three isolates showed that Aspergillus flavus had optimum temperature at 40° C while Aspergillus niger and Aspergillus fumigatus both showed optimum activity at 35°C.On the effect of pH all the Aspergillus species showed optimum polygalacturonase activities at pH 4.5 The enzyme had an approximate molecular weight of 53kDa. Metal ions affects the activity of polygalacturonase produced by the three isolates They were activated by Ca2+ and significantly inhibited by Ba2+, Hg2+.Application of PG in fruit juice clarification was found.
