Findings and development of useful biocatalysts from marine and extreme bioresources

Abstract

To develop useful biocatalysts from marine and extreme bio-resources, we are currently putting a lot of efforts to collect marine resources from a variety of marine environments such as cold seep, hydrothermal vent, deep sea, sediment, tidal flat area, marine organisms and so on. The collected samples were routinely pretreated or enriched with various reagents for the purpose of enhancing the survival of useful target microorganisms, and then the isolated bacteria were stored systemically based on the analysis of 16S rRNA sequences. The collected resources were distributed to collaborators or participants in the research program and tested for various biocatalytic activities. In addition to developing useful biocatalysts by screening isolated bacterial resources in a conventional approach, the genomic approach has been also applied to determine whole genome sequence of a limited number of microorganisms collected from various extreme environments, showing extraordinary physiological characteristics. The collected genetic information is put on intensive bioinformatic analysis to develop useful biocatalyst in silico. In this review, the current research on the development of DNA polymerase, lipases from metagenome or bacterial resources, epoxide hydrolases from fish or marine bacteria, beta-agarase and phospholipase D was discussed. The following studies show that marine resources are also invaluable resources for the useful biocatalysts, and the enzymes from marine and extreme bio-resources have a great potential to be effectively used as a novel biocatalyst for research purpose and for production of chiral bioactive compound in the pharmaceutical industry as well.