Song's team found a new protease that can be used to prepare gelatin

The new protease technology is of great significance to the utilization of resources and the maintenance of environment, and also has good compatibility with the existing equipment of bone processing and gelatin extraction In addition, in terms of production, no additional unique process equipment is needed The traditional process can be quickly converted into enzyme process, which is convenient to expand the production scale Gelatin is the hydrolysate of collagen, which is widely used in more than 30 industries, such as medicine, food, textile, chemical industry, electronics, papermaking, printing, etc In recent years, with the research progress of various enzymes and the innovation of green technology, the technology of enzymatic preparation of gelatin has become a new direction that researchers continue to explore Recently, song Xiao, a researcher of Tianjin Institute of industrial biotechnology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, led the research team to discover a new protease that can be used for gelatin preparation by sequencing the macro genome of soil samples Based on the enzyme, the technology of gelatin preparation by protease method was optimized Song told China Science Daily that the new protease technology for gelatin preparation is of great significance for resource utilization and environmental maintenance, and has good compatibility with the existing equipment for bone processing and gelatin extraction In addition, in terms of production, no additional unique process equipment is needed The traditional process can be quickly converted into enzyme process, which is convenient to expand the production scale The process needs to be optimized continuously In 2010, the world demand for gelatin is about 445000 tons It is estimated that the annual growth rate of gelatin demand in the next five years will reach 9% Due to objective reasons, the traditional bone gelatin preparation industry in China is mainly concentrated in the areas with rich bone resources, such as Inner Mongolia, Qinghai, Gansu and other places At the same time, because the traditional bone gelatin preparation process has to go through many steps, such as pickling, washing, liming, neutralization, etc., there is a great demand for fresh water, but the fresh water resources in the above areas are very scarce The limitations of regional resources and traditional technology limit the development of gelatin industry, which puts forward urgent requirements for the innovation of gelatin technology In the 1980s, the enzyme method for gelatin production appeared The enzyme method for gelatin production mainly uses biological enzymes to act on animal bones or skin, and degrade collagen macromolecules to produce gelatin According to song Xiao, through the preparation of bone gelatin by enzyme method, the steps of acid-base washing can be omitted for many times, which can be simplified into one-step reaction of acid and enzyme treatment, shorten the process flow, reduce the consumption of fresh water by more than 90%, and save a lot of energy and acid-base reagents at the same time "Because it can shorten the production cycle, reduce environmental pollution, easy to control automatically and refine the quality of gelatin, it is the development trend of gelatin preparation technology." Tan Ming, a researcher in the research group of genetic engineering and microbial application technology at Tianjin Institute of industrial biotechnology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, added However, there are still some shortcomings in the enzymatic preparation of gelatin First of all, there are problems of pollution and energy consumption in the preparation process of protease extraction automatic plants (such as animal viscera, papaya, pineapple, etc.) which are currently used in enzymatic hydrolysis Secondly, the stability of protease products from animals and plants needs to be improved, and the enzyme activity is low Third, the protease activity is easily affected by the hydrolysate, and it is easy to lose its activity In addition, the specificity of collagen hydrolysate formed by enzymatic method is poor, which affects the quality of gelatin products During the process of gelatin preparation, it is necessary to adjust the pH value artificially, which limits the development of enzymatic method Under the above background, the research team of genetic engineering and microbial application technology of Tianjin Institute of industrial biotechnology, Chinese Academy of Sciences has focused on the study of new enzymes in gelatinase preparation According to song, the deficiency of enzyme method is caused by the limitation of protease itself, but there is no high temperature protein for gelatin preparation in domestic and foreign markets Therefore, song's research team extracted relevant genes from microorganisms that can survive in extreme soil environment, and then modified the high-temperature protease specifically and expressed it externally, resulting in a large number of industrial protease Then, they screened and studied the new protease, and preliminarily tested some protease which may be used to prepare gelatin Through the comprehensive evaluation of the process and product index, they found a new protease with better effect At the same time, song's research team innovated the process of enzyme preparation of gelatin, changing the subsequent extraction process from the traditional multi-channel extraction process to two-stage extraction In the process of using the new protease to prepare gelatin, the first extraction accounts for 12% of the total yield of gelatin, which is close to the total yield of the multi-step extraction of gelatin by the traditional acid-base method The total yield of gelatin prepared by the new protease method is also 14% ~ 15% higher than that by the traditional method, reaching 17% Song said that compared with the gelatin prepared by the traditional acid-base method, the protein electrophoresis bands of the enzyme method gelatin are more concentrated and single, and the gel power value of the obtained gelatin can reach more than 250 blog, and the viscosity value can reach 4.0Mpa · s, which is equivalent to the traditional method The total production cycle of gelatin was shortened from more than 60 days to 5 days, and the consumption of fresh water was reduced by 90% At the same time, the consumption of large amount of energy and chemical agents was reduced The green technology of gelatin preparation was realized Industrialization also needs to "convince" manufacturers that the next step of song's research team is to continue to carry out molecular transformation of protein characteristics such as temperature characteristics, pH characteristics, and action efficiency according to the technical indicators of gelatin (freezing force, viscosity, transmittance) "We also need to optimize the optimal enzyme compounding scheme, explore and optimize the compound enzyme formula applied to the green enzyme preparation process of gelatin, optimize the new enzyme biological preparation process of gelatin, and carry out the process amplification and industrial production demonstration together with the cooperative enterprises It will take another 1-2 years for the whole process to be mature and put into operation " Song said Another research team of the Chinese Academy of Sciences is aiming at the industrialization of enzymatic gelatin production According to a researcher of the research team who did not want to be named, the enzymatic gelatin production process of the research team has been carried out in Ningxia, Inner Mongolia and other provinces and regions Some of the products of the enterprise have been put on the market and formed sales, and will be further promoted in other regions However, the researcher believes that there is still a long way to go before the traditional chemical process can be completely replaced in the industrialization process The researcher pointed out that in the industrialization, there are still some important problems in enzyme preparation, such as the stability of the production process of enzyme preparation of gelatin, the acceptance and approval process of enzyme preparation of gelatin in the downstream enterprises such as food, medicine, etc Song said that at present, most of the gelatin manufacturers use the traditional chemical method If they change the enzyme method, they need to prove that the new technology can bring huge economic benefits to the enterprises "Many enterprises can't accept this risk if they want to transform the traditional process and establish a new production line At present, some large enterprises don't have too much competitive pressure and have little interest in process innovation Therefore, how to further prove the great value of enzymatic process is a challenge for us." Song Zhe stressed.