African Journal of
Biotechnology

  • Abbreviation: Afr. J. Biotechnol.
  • Language: English
  • ISSN: 1684-5315
  • DOI: 10.5897/AJB
  • Start Year: 2002
  • Published Articles: 12500

Review

Engineering the functional fitness of transglycosidases and glycosynthases by directed evolution

George Oyamo Osanjo1,2,3*, Wallace Dimbuson Bulimo4 and Francis J. Mulaa2,4
  1Department of Pharmacology and Pharmacognosy, University of Nairobi, PO Box 19676-00202 KNH, Nairobi, Kenya. 2Centre for Biotechnology and Bioinformatics, University of Nairobi, PO Box 30197-00100, Nairobi, Kenya. 3Africa Institute of Biomedical Science & Technology (AiBST-Nairobi), PO Box 19676-00202 KNH, Nairobi, Kenya. 4Department of Biochemistry, University of Nairobi, P.O. Box 30197 – 00100, Nairobi, Kenya
Email: [email protected]

  •  Accepted: 10 February 2011
  •  Published: 07 March 2011

Abstract

 

The artificial implementation of the Darwinian theory of evolution to create new variants of functional proteins, a process referred to as directed evolution, has acquired many applications in biochemical engineering. Directed evolution is a handy tool in the nascent science of glycobiology, where it is used in the conversion of glycosyl hydrolases into transglycosidases or for improving the transglycosylation behaviour of glycosynthases. This review focuses on recent applications of the directed evolution approach to harness the transglycosidase potential of glycosidases and to enhance the functional fitness of glycosynthases.

 

Key words: Directed evolution, transglycosidases, glycosidases, glycosynthases, oligosaccharides.

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This article is published under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License 4.0

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