Pectinase and Protease essays

Pectinase and Protease essays NOTE:Just so you know, I received full 100% on this paper. By the way, I am doing the I.B. An enzyme is simply a protein which acts as a catalyst in biochemical reactions. Each enzyme is specific to a particular reaction or group of reactions. Since enzymes act as catalysts, they are considered to be tremendously precious to industrial biotechnology. Attempts to use enzymes in the manufacturing field have been recorded as far back as the late 1800s. Since then, weve come a long way. Now a days, enzymes are commonly used by industries to process starch, brew and make cheese. There are two enzymes, which are exceedingly important in the biotechnology industry, they are pectinase and protease. Pectinases are actually a mixture of enzymes, which, along with others such as cellulase, are widely used in the fruit juice industry where they are widely used to help extract, clarify and modify fruit juice. Pectins are large polysaccharide molecules, made up mainly of chains of several hundred galacturonic acid residues. Enzymes in this pectinase group include polygalacturonases, pectin methyl esterase and pectin lyases. These pectinase enzymes act in different ways on the pectins, which are found in the primary cell walls and in the middle lamella. Pectins are well known for their ability to form gels. Pectinases are produced during the natural ripening process of some fruits, where together with cellulases, they help to soften their cell walls. These enzymes are also secreted by plant pathogens such as the fungus Monilinia fructigena and the soft-rot bacterium Erwinia carotovora, as part of their strategy for penetrating the plant host cell walls. In fact, the products of such enzyme assaults act as a signal which induces uninfected cells to defend themselves. Protease refer to a group of enzymes whose function it is to break down proteins and are also referred to as proteolytic enzymes or proteinases. T ...