Because of some the difficulties using chitin in studies of chitinolytic activity, I was wondering if anyone has tried using chitosan as a simpler form of chitin, to either find chitinolytic microbes or chitinolytic activity? How useful is it? Does it detect most microbes with chitinolytic activity?
Hi Robert,
Agree with Michael, and in practice it doesn't work either :). The N-acetyl group is used in the binding of the Chitin to the enzyme. In my limited (and now old) experience there can be some hydrolysis of chitosan by some chitinase preparations but so much lower so I wouldn't go there (could have also been due to contamination by chitosanases).
Cheers
Paul
Dear Sir, Tab Chitosan 1000 mg along with all other natural medication and strict diet pattern brought down the serum creatinine level in the blood when practiced with my CKD patients. Thanks
Just had a thought while driving to work that the solubility of chitin may be your issue. If so the chitino-oligosaccharides could be the answer, as the solubility is better and their degradation can be followed by HPLC, MS, FACE or a number of other techniques
- Badges
- Science topic
- Similar topics
- Biological Science
- Biochemistry
- Enzymology
- Enzymes