Hydrolysis of macromolecules

Applications of whole-cell biocatalytic membrane reactors, in the agro-food industry and in pharmaceutical and biomedical treatments are listed by Giorno and Drioli [3], Frazeres and Cabral [9] have reviewed the most important applications of enzyme membrane reactors such as hydrolysis of macromolecules, biotransformation of lipids, reactions with cofactors, synthesis of peptides, optical resolution of amino acids. Another widespread application of the membrane bioreactor is the wastewater treatment will be discussed in a separate section. 

Bioreactors with immobilized enzymes or whole cells are utilized in a variety of areas. EMR have found widespread applications in the hydrolysis of macromolecules - proteins, poly- and oligosaccharides, lipids, etc. - for food and pharmaceutical applications (Prazeres and Cabral, 1994). More recently they have also begun to find application for the removal of various pollutants from wastewaters. An overview of the literature in these fields is described below. 

Hydrolysis of polyacrylamide under basic conditions is guide rapid and can be used to introduce acrylate groups into macromolecules. 

At hydrolysis of polyacrylamide in 10 M NaCl at I00°C, the degree of hydrolysis becomes —95%, but in this case a degradation of the macromolecules is observed. Various modes of hydrolysis of polyacrylamide under basic conditions have been reviewed [2,12]. 

Part of this symposium was directed to the synthesis, properties and applications of inorganic and organometallic macromolecules with network structures. The section on organo-oxo macromolecules relevant to sol-gel processing addresses the interesting synthesis and challenging characterization efforts in this area. Brinker (p. 314) outlines the complex chemical and physical factors which affect network formation and structure resulting from the hydrolysis of a tetraalkoxysilane. 

Recently, highly branched macromolecular polyamidoamine dendrimers have been prepared with Co11 bound where the metal ions have additional exchangeable coordination sites.450 These macromolecules show a capacity for catalyzing the hydrolysis of phosphate esters, presumably via intermediate bound phosphoester species. 

Algaenans Hydrolysis resistant macromolecules of algal origin. 

Ronkvist AM, Xie WC, Lu WH et al (2009) Cutinase-catalyzed hydrolysis of poly(ethylene terephthalate). Macromolecules 42 5128-5138... 

Hjerde, T., Smidsrad, O., Christensen, B.E. (1998b). Acid hydrolysis of k- and i-carra-geenan in the disordered and ordered conformations characterization of partially hydrolyzed samples and single-stranded oligomers released from the ordered structures. Macromolecules, 31, 1842-1851. 

Carbadox-related residues can also be monitored by conversion to quinoxa-line-2-carboxylic acid. This conversion as well as its liberation are accomplished by alkaline hydrolysis of tissue, followed by isolation of the analyte from indigenous hydrolysis products through extraction and cleanup procedures (419-422). Enzymatic digestion of swine tissues with subtilisin A, which liberates quinoxa-line-2-carboxylic acid from macromolecules, has also been reported (423). 

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