Recent advances on sources and industrial applications of lipases.

Lipases are the industrially important biocatalysts, which are envisioned to have tremendous applications in the manufacture of a wide range of products. Their unique properties such as better stability, selectivity and substrate specificity position them as the most expansively used industrial enzymes. The research on production and applications of lipases is ever growing and there exists a need to have a latest review on the research findings of lipases. The present review aims at giving the latest and broadest overall picture of research and development on lipases by including the current studies and progressions not only in the diverse industrial application fields of lipases, but also with regard to its structure, classification and sources. Also, a special emphasis has been made on the aspects such as process optimization, modeling, and design that are very critical for further scale-up and industrial implementation. The detailed tabulations provided in each section, which are prepared by the exhaustive review of current literature covering the various aspects of lipase including its production and applications along with example case studies, will serve as the comprehensive source of current advancements in lipase research. This review will be very useful for the researchers from both industry as well as academia in promoting lipolysis as the most promising approaches to intensified, greener and sustainable processes. © 2017 American Institute of Chemical Engineers Biotechnol. Prog., 34:5-28, 2018.

Modelling of pretreatment and saccharification with different feedstocks and kinetic modeling of sorghum saccharification.

Experiments have been performed for pretreatment of sorghum, wheat straw and bamboo through high temperature alkali pretreatment with different alkaline loading and temperatures, and the data on extent of delignification in terms of the final compositions of cellulose, hemicellulose and lignin have been generated. Further, enzymatic saccharification has been carried out in all the cases to find the extent of conversion possible after 72h. The effect of different operating parameters on the extent of delignification and cellulose conversion are evaluated. This data is employed to develop a generalized multi-feedstock and individual feedstock based models which can be used to determine the extent of delignification and cellulose conversion for any and specific biomass respectively with alkaline pretreatment and similar enzyme conditions as considered in the present study. Also, a kinetic model is developed and validated for sorghum for cellulosic conversion.

Design and synthesis of novel chrysene-linked pyrrolo[2,1-c][1,4]-benzodiazepine hybrids as potential DNA-binding agents.

Chrysene-linked pyrrolobenzodiazepine hybrids have been prepared that possess cytotoxicity in some cancer cell lines. They also exhibit promising DNA-binding affinity and this is supported by molecular modeling studies.

Determination of enantiomeric excess of alpha-hydroxy-3-phenoxybenzeneacetonitrile and its n-butyl ester by chiral high-performance liquid chromatography.

Determination of enantiomeric excess of alpha-hydroxy-3-phenoxybenzeneacetonitrile, an important intermediate in the production of several pyrethroid insecticides, is usually done after derivatization and gas chromatographic analysis on a beta-cyclodextrin-based column. In this communication we report a direct determination of enantiomeric excess of alpha-hydroxy-3-phenoxybenzeneacetonitrile and its n-butyl ester by chiral HPLC on Chiralcel OJ (Daicel, Japan) in a single run without derivatization.