Biocatalysis is generally regarded as a "green" technology. This statement is justified by the mild reaction conditions, the use of aqueous reaction media-with water as the paradigm of green solvents-, and the renewable nature of the biocatalysts. However, researchers making these statements frequently do not take into account the entire picture of their processes. Aspects like water consumptio...

Sesquiterpenes are an important family of natural products, many of which exhibit important pharmaceutical and agricultural properties. They are biosynthesised from farnesyl diphosphate in sesquiterpene synthase catalysed reactions. Here, we report the development of a highly efficient segmented flow system for the enzyme-catalysed continuous flow production of sesquiterpenes. Design of experim...

Esterases (EC 3.1.1.x) represent a diverse group of hydrolases catalyzing the cleavage and formation of ester bonds and are widely distributed in animals, plants and microorganisms. Beside lipases, a considerable number of microbial carboxyl esterases have also been discovered and overexpressed. This review summarizes their properties and classification. Special emphasis is given on their appli...

Effective application of whole-cell devices in synthetic biology and biocatalysis will always require consideration of the uptake of molecules of interest into the cell. Here we demonstrate that the AlkL protein from Pseudomonas putida GPo1 is an alkane import protein capable of industrially relevant rates of uptake of C7-C16 n-alkanes. Without alkL expression, native E.coli n-alkane uptake was...

Cofactor-dependent enzymes catalyze many synthetically useful reactions. The high cost of cofactors, however, necessitates in situ cofactor regeneration for preparative applications. After two decades of research, several cofactors can now be effectively regenerated using enzyme or whole-cell based methods. Significant advances have been made in this area in the past three years and include the...

Due to the growing demand of enantiomerically pure compounds, as well as the increasing strict safety, quality and environmentally requirements of industrial synthetic processes, the development of more sustainable, healthy and economically attractive strategies for the synthesis of chiral biologically active molecules is still an open challenge in the pharmaceutical industry. In this context, ...

Synthesis of indolyl 4H-chromenes via a three-component reaction catalyzed by lipase in ionic liquidsis reported here for the first time. High yields (77–98%) were obtained when Mucor miehei lipase was used as the catalyst in [EMIM][BF4]. Furthermore, [EMIM][BF4] exhibited good reusability in this enzymatic reaction. This study affords a new example of lipase catalytic promiscuity and broadens ...

The hyperthermophilic archaeon Thermococcus litoralis strain NS-C, first isolated in 1985, has been a foundational organism for archaeal research in biocatalysis, DNA replication, metabolism, and the discovery of inteins. Here, we present the genome sequence of T. litoralis with a focus on the replication machinery and inteins.

Glucose oxidase (EC 1.1.3.4) is the most widely employed enzyme as analytical reagent. This is the result of (1) its utility in the determination of glucose, an analyte of wide analytical interest, and (2) its relatively low cost and good stability that make the glucose/glucose oxidase system a very convenient model for method development (particularly in the area of biosensors). This review di...

In the early days of biocatalysis, limitations of an enzyme modeled the enzymatic applications; nowadays the enzyme can be engineered to be suitable for the process requirements. This is a general bird's-eye view and as such cannot be specific for articulated situations found in different classes of enzymes or for selected enzymatic processes. As far as the enzymatic preparation of glycosides i...