Enzymatic hydrolysis of thermally pre‐treated chitin and antimicrobial activity of N,N′‐diacetylchitobiose

Abstract

AbstractBACKGROUNDN,N′‐diacetylchitobiose (GlcNAc2) is known to be highly functional and offers a wide range of applications, especially as an antimicrobial agent. In this study, a thermal pre‐treatment process using steam under pressure in an autoclave was employed to facilitate subsequent enzymatic hydrolysis of chitin with chitinase from Streptomyces griseus.RESULTSPre‐treatment of chitin with 0.05 mol L−1 sodium acetate buffer (pH = 6.0) at 121 °C for 60 min, followed by enzymatic hydrolysis involving 24 h incubation, were found to be the best conditions for producing GlcNAc2. The GlcNAc2 thus obtained was tested regarding its antimicrobial activity against Gram‐negative and Gram‐positive strains and showed minimum inhibitory concentrations at 5 and 10% (w/v) against Escherichia coli K‐12 and Listeria monocytogenes 10403S, respectively.CONCLUSIONSThe extent of swelling and crystallite size of chitin increased with pre‐treatment residence time, and enhanced the rate of subsequent hydrolysis using chitinase. © 2019 Society of Chemical Industry