Microbial Proteases

Proteases represent one of the three largest groups of industrial enzymes and account for about 60% of the total worldwide sale of enzymes. They are degradative enzymes of central importance because they can be employed in a number of industries to create change in product taste, texture, and appearance, as well as in waste recovery. They are also important in medical and pharmaceutical applications. Microorganisms represent an excellent source of proteases owing to their broad biochemical diversity and their susceptibility to genetic manipulation. In the microbial fermentation process, optimization of culture media is important to yield an economically viable amount of proteases. Taking into consideration the need for large-scale production of proteases, a brief outline of production techniques, recovery, purification, and characterization is discussed here.