Paper Report for: Kirsh_1935_Int.J.Plant.Sci_97_321

1. Penicillium oxalicum and Aspergillus flavus produce a water soluble enzyme capable of hydrolyzing olive oil when grown on a bran-wood flour-olive oil medium or a bran-soy bean medium. 2. The most active extracts were obtained on the soy bean medium, which brought about as much as 50 per cent hydrolysis of the oil in 20 hours. 3. On the bran-wood flour-olive oil medium, the optimum concentration of the oil for lipase production lies between 2.5 and 5 per cent. 4. Lipase production is greatest after three to four days' incubation, or just at the time of complete sporulation. 5. Enzyme production is greatest when the cultures are incubated at 28C. in a water bath. At this temperature in a hot air incubator, some of the lipase is apparently destroyed by the heat given off by the growing fungus. 6. A ratio of about 7.5 parts of soy bean to 12.5 parts of bran yields the best medium for lipase production. 7. Slightly more lipase is elaborated on a medium containing soy beans than on one containing soy bean meal. Flax seed and cotton seed do not result in as high a yield of lipase, although the meals produced from these seeds serve equally as well as the seeds themselves. 8. The enzyme precipitated from the Penicillium oxalicum extract by means of alcohol contained eight and a half times more lipase per unit of protease than did a commercial high lipase trypsin. The activity was low when the enzyme was obtained from large cultures; the dry enzyme prepared from 40 gm. lots of medium showed good activity.