Industrial applications of fungal lipases: a review

Ashish Kumar; Vinita Verma; Vimal Kumar Dubey; Alok Srivastava; Sanjay Kumar Garg; Vijay Pal Singh; Pankaj Kumar Arora

doi:10.3389/fmicb.2023.1142536

Industrial applications of fungal lipases: a review

Front Microbiol. 2023 Apr 28:14:1142536. doi: 10.3389/fmicb.2023.1142536. eCollection 2023.

Authors

Ashish Kumar¹, Vinita Verma¹, Vimal Kumar Dubey², Alok Srivastava³, Sanjay Kumar Garg³, Vijay Pal Singh³, Pankaj Kumar Arora¹

Affiliations

¹ Department of Environmental Microbiology, Babasaheb Bhimrao Ambedkar University, Lucknow, India.
² College of Agriculture Sciences, Teerthanker Mahaveer University, Moradabad, Uttar Pradesh, India.
³ Department of Plant Science, Faculty of Applied Sciences, MJP Rohilkhand University, Bareilly, India.

Abstract

Fungal lipases (triacylglycerol acyl hydrolases EC 3.1.1.3) are significant industrial enzymes and have several applications in a number of industries and fields. Fungal lipases are found in several species of fungi and yeast. These enzymes are carboxylic acid esterases, categorized under the serine hydrolase family, and do not require any cofactor during the catalyzing of the reactions. It was also noticed that processes including the extraction and purification of lipases from fungi are comparatively easier and cheaper than other sources of lipases. In addition, fungal lipases have been classified into three chief classes, namely, GX, GGGX, and Y. Fungal lipases have applications not only in the hydrolysis of fats and oils (triglycerides) but are also involved in synthetic reactions such as esterification, acidolysis, alcoholysis, interesterification, and aminolysis. The production and activity of fungal lipases are highly affected by the carbon source, nitrogen source, temperature, pH, metal ions, surfactants, and moisture content. Therefore, fungal lipases have several industrial and biotechnological applications in many fields such as biodiesel production, ester synthesis, production of biodegradable biopolymers, formulations of cosmetics and personal care products, detergent manufacturing, degreasing of leather, pulp and paper production, textile industry, biosensor development, and drug formulations and as a diagnostic tool in the medical sector, biodegradation of esters, and bioremediation of wastewater. The immobilization of fungal lipases onto different carriers also helps in improving the catalytic activities and efficiencies of lipases by increasing thermal and ionic stability (in organic solvents, high pH, and temperature), being easy to recycle, and inducing the volume-specific loading of the enzyme onto the support, and thus, these features have proved to be appropriate for use as biocatalysts in different sectors.

Keywords: bioethanol; biosensor; fungi; immobilization; lipase.

Publication types

Review