Spatially confined lignin nanospheres for biocatalytic ester synthesis in aqueous media

Mika Henrikki Sipponen (), Muhammad Farooq, Jari Koivisto, Alessandro Pellis, Jani Seitsonen and Monika Österberg ()
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Mika Henrikki Sipponen: Aalto University
Muhammad Farooq: Aalto University
Jari Koivisto: Aalto University
Alessandro Pellis: University of York, Heslington
Jani Seitsonen: Aalto University
Monika Österberg: Aalto University

Nature Communications, 2018, vol. 9, issue 1, 1-7

Abstract: Abstract Dehydration reactions proceed readily in water-filled biological cells. Development of biocatalysts that mimic such compartmentalized reactions has been cumbersome due to the lack of low-cost nanomaterials and associated technologies. Here we show that cationic lignin nanospheres function as activating anchors for hydrolases, and enable aqueous ester synthesis by forming spatially confined biocatalysts upon self-assembly and drying-driven aggregation in calcium alginate hydrogel. Spatially confined microbial cutinase and lipase retain 97% and 70% of their respective synthetic activities when the volume ratio of water to hexane increases from 1:1 to 9:1 in the reaction medium. The activity retention of industrially most frequently used acrylic resin-immobilized Candida antarctica lipase B is only 51% under similar test conditions. Overall, our findings enable fabrication of robust renewable biocatalysts for aqueous ester synthesis, and provide insight into the compartmentalization of diverse heterogeneous catalysts.

Date: 2018
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DOI: 10.1038/s41467-018-04715-6

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