Isolation of α-amylase from malted rice (Wita 7) extract using cassava starch column procedure

Abstract

The current study investigated the production and purification of α-amylase from malted rice (Wita 7) extract. In the course of the study, malting parameters such as germination energy, malt yield as well as malt loss of rice (Wita 7) were estimated. An appraisal of α-amylase production during malting with rice (Wita 7) revealed that, the production level peaked on the 8th day of germination with an estimated activity of 19.436 U/ml. The crude α-amylase from the 8th day malt extract was subsequently purified using starch column procedure. The purified extract recorded an estimated activity of 75.549 U/ml. The project further examined the effects of varying the ratios of starch adsorbent height to column diameter (L/D) during the purification step. For the columns employed (ID = 2.45 cm; 4.15 cm), the 2nd elution fractions from the experiments which were conducted with L/D ratios greater than 0.33 contained the highest amount of α-amylase. In summary, we have revealed that, the 8th day malt was most effective (optimum malting time) for starch hydrolysis. Again, the purification process produced a 4-fold enzyme activity ratio of 19:75. Finally, the greater the L/D ratio, the higher the efficacy for purification.

Keywords: Alpha Amylase, Wita 7 rice, Malting, Starch adsorbent, Elution fraction

African Journal of Biotechnology Vol. 12(23), pp. 3738-3744