Taxonomic Characters and Culture Conditions of a Bacterium which Produces a Lytic Enzyme on Rhizopus Cell Wall

Abstract

A bacterium R–4 which produces a novel type of lytic enzyme which lyses fungal and yeast cell walls was isolated from the air and was identified to belong to the genus Bacillus.Production of the enzyme appeared to require a high concentration of nitrogen source in medium. No inducing substance was needed for the enzyme production.A crude preparation of the enzyme was used to characterize the lytic activity. From the lytic spectrum, the enzyme seemed to have the highest activity toward the cell walls of species in the genus Rhizopus among various fungi and yeasts tested, A proteolytic activity was shown to be parallel with the lytic activity. The lytic activity was also accompanied with the liberation of reducing sugars from Rhizopus cell wall, but no activity on some known carbohydrates tested was detected in the preparation.