Publication Details

Category Text Publication
Reference Category Journals
DOI 10.1016/j.soilbio.2010.08.018
Title (Primary) Hydrolysis of cellobiose by β-glucosidase in the presence of soil minerals - Interactions at solid-liquid interfaces and effects on enzyme activity levels
Author Lammirato, C.; Miltner, A. ORCID logo ; Wick, L.Y.; Kästner, M.
Source Titel Soil Biology & Biochemistry
Year 2010
Department UMB; UBT
Volume 42
Issue 12
Page From 2203
Page To 2210
Language englisch
Keywords ß-Glucosidase; Aspergillus niger; Cellobiose; Montmorillonite; Kaolinite; Goethite; Adsorption; Enzymatic activity
Abstract Extracellular enzymatic activities in soils are essential for the cycling of organic matter. These activities take place in multiphase environments where solid phases profoundly affect biocatalytic activities. Aspergillus niger is ubiquitous in soils; its ß-glucosidase plays an important role in the degradation of cellulose, and therefore in the global carbon cycle and in the turnover of soil organic matter. However, the information on the interactions of this protein with soil minerals is very limited, and even less is known about their consequences for the hydrolysis of the natural substrate cellobiose. We therefore characterised the sorptive interactions of this enzyme with the soil minerals montmorillonite, kaolinite and goethite and quantified the resulting changes in the hydrolysis rate of cellobiose. Fractions of adsorbed protein, and the resulting catalytic activity loss, were lower for montmorillonite than for kaolinite and goethite at given experimental conditions; adsorption was 9.7 ± 7.3% for montmorillonite, 70.3 ± 3.1% for kaolinite and 71.4 ± 1.8% for goethite, respectively. Adsorption of the protein to the minerals caused a total decrease in the catalytic activity of 18.8 ± 3.4% for kaolinite and 17.9 ± 4.7% for goethite whereas it was not significant for montmorillonite. The average catalytic activity lost by the pool of adsorbed molecules was 26.8% for kaolinite and 25.0% for goethite. Both the amount of adsorbed protein and the resulting loss of catalytic activity were found to be independent of the specific surface areas yet were influenced by the electrical properties of the mineral surfaces. Under the experimental conditions, montmorillonite and kaolinite are negatively charged whereas goethite is positively charged. However, because of the adsorption of phosphate anions from the buffer, a charge reversal took place at the surface of goethite. This was confirmed by zeta (?)-potential measurements in phosphate buffer, revealing negative values for all the tested minerals. Indeed goethite interacted with the enzyme as a negatively charged surface: the amount of adsorbed protein and the resulting catalytic activity loss were very similar to those of kaolinite. Our results show that, even if an important fraction of ß-glucosidase is adsorbed to the minerals, the catalytic activity is largely retained. We suggest that this strong activity retention in presence of soil minerals results from a selective pressure on A. niger, which benefits from the activity of the adsorbed, and thus stabilized, enzyme pool.
Persistent UFZ Identifier https://www.ufz.de/index.php?en=20939&ufzPublicationIdentifier=10232
Lammirato, C., Miltner, A., Wick, L.Y., Kästner, M. (2010):
Hydrolysis of cellobiose by β-glucosidase in the presence of soil minerals - Interactions at solid-liquid interfaces and effects on enzyme activity levels
Soil Biol. Biochem. 42 (12), 2203 - 2210 10.1016/j.soilbio.2010.08.018