Optimum temperature may be a misleading parameter in enzyme characterization and application.

ABSTRACT: The optimum temperature is commonly determined in enzyme characterization. A search in the PubMed database for "optimum temperature" and "enzymes" yielded more than 1,700 manuscripts reporting this parameter over the last five years. Here, we show that the optimum temperature is not a constant. The catalytic activity of the mesophylic β-glucosidase Sfβgly was determined at different temperatures using different assay times and enzyme concentrations. We observed that the optimum temperature for Sfβgly changed by 5°C simply by modifying the assay length, and it was inversely correlated with enzyme concentration. These observations rely on the fact that close to the melting temperature, thermal denaturation continuously decreases the active enzyme concentration as the assay progresses. Thus,

SUBMITTER: Almeida VM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6386375 | biostudies-literature | 2019

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature