<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><article>
  <article-id pub-id-type="internal">12901</article-id>
  <article-id pub-id-type="doi">10.30848/PJB2024-5(28)</article-id>
  <article-title>&lt;p&gt;
	Enhanced production of alkaline protease enzyme by mutated Aspergillus oryzae developed by random mutagenesis&lt;/p&gt;
</article-title>
  <contrib-group><contrib><name><string>Saif-Ur-Rehman, Asad Ali, Anam Saqib, Rubab Ramzan, Haidar Ali and Muhammad Hamid Rashid </string></name></contrib></contrib-group>
  <abstract>&lt;p&gt;
	Thermostability is an important attribute and a prerequisite for the enzymes used in industrial processes. &lt;em&gt;Aspergillus oyzae&lt;/em&gt; has the potential to produce proteases for industrial applications. In this study, &lt;em&gt;A. oryzae&lt;/em&gt; mutants were used to identify hyper-producers of thermostable proteases. Initially, 22 mutants were selected on the basis of their growth performance, cultured on 1% skimmed milk media plates and &lt;em&gt;Clearing Indexes&lt;/em&gt; (&lt;em&gt;CI&lt;/em&gt;). Five mutants with higher &amp;lsquo;&lt;em&gt;CI&lt;/em&gt;&amp;rsquo; were selected for submerged fermentation employing 1% casein as substrate and following growth conditions were used: pH 6.5, temperature 30&amp;deg;C and shaking at 150 rpm for 84 hr. Irreversible thermostability was determined at 65&amp;deg;C using pseudo-first order plots. Mutant strain M-120(3) showed highest production and thermostability of protease compared to control and other mutants with half-life (t&lt;em&gt;&amp;frac12;&lt;/em&gt;) of 125 min. Effect of temperature and substrate concentration on growth kinetics of Mutant M-120(3) were determined showing optimum temperature of 32&amp;deg;C with a specific growth rate (&lt;em&gt;&amp;micro;&lt;/em&gt;) of 0.037h&lt;sup&gt;-1&lt;/sup&gt; and specific rate of product formation (&lt;em&gt;q&lt;sub&gt;p&lt;/sub&gt;&lt;/em&gt;) of 0.31 (U g&lt;sup&gt;-1&lt;/sup&gt;h&lt;sup&gt;-1&lt;/sup&gt;). Kinetics and thermodynamic parameters confirmed that mutant strain M-120(3) required less activation energy (&lt;em&gt;E&lt;sub&gt;a&lt;/sub&gt;&lt;/em&gt;) to produce protease enzyme (&lt;em&gt;E&lt;sub&gt;ap&lt;/sub&gt;&lt;/em&gt; = 65.22 kJ mol&lt;sup&gt;-1&lt;/sup&gt;) and cell mass (&lt;em&gt;E&lt;sub&gt;ax&lt;/sub&gt;&lt;/em&gt; = 29.074 kJ mol&lt;sup&gt;-1&lt;/sup&gt;) than control strain. It had low maximum specific rate of cell mass formation (&lt;em&gt;&amp;micro;&lt;sub&gt;max&lt;/sub&gt;&lt;/em&gt;) 0.043 kJ mol&lt;sup&gt;-1&lt;/sup&gt; and higher maximum specific rate of product formation (&lt;em&gt;q&lt;sub&gt;p&lt;/sub&gt;&lt;/em&gt;) 1.07 kJ mol&lt;sup&gt;-1&lt;/sup&gt;. These parameters confirmed that Mutant M-120(3) had great potential for commercial scale production of thermostable proteases for industrial application&lt;/p&gt;
</abstract>
  <publication-status>Published</publication-status>
  <year>2024</year>
  <volume>56</volume>
  <issue>5</issue>
  <pages-from>1799</pages-from>
  <pages-to>1809</pages-to>
</article>
