Whole cell enzyme composition containing fumed silica
AssigneePenick & Ford, Limited
InventorsRobert E. Brouillard, Hirschel A. Katz, Howard L. Muenchow
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Abstract
A dimensionally stable glucose isomerase composition having improved hydraulic characteristics and suitable for continuous column isomerization of glucose to fructose is produced by incorporating a low density, high surface area silica such as fumed silica into wet whole microorganism cells, and extruding and drying the cells to obtain the cells in particulate form suitable for continuous column use. This technique is also applicable to microorganism cells containing other enzymes.
Claims20
A process for preparing a column material comprising enzyme-containing microorganism cell particles of improved strength, which process comprises blending an effective strength-improving amount of fumed silica into flocculated wet enzyme-containing whole microorganism cells which have not been previously dried, extruding the resulting mixture and drying the extruded cells.
An enzyme composition in particulate form for use in a column comprising flocculated whole microorganism cells having an enzyme associated therewith, said cells containing an effective strength-imparting amount of fumed silica.
A process for carrying out an enzyme-catalyzed transformation of a substrate which comprises contacting an aqueous solution of said substrate with particles of an enzyme composition comprising a column bed of flocculated whole microorganism cells having an enzyme associated therewith, said cells containing an effective strength-imparting amount of fumed silica.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.