The fine structure of Sarcina maxima and S. ventriculi was studied by electron and phase-contrast microscopy. The two organisms differ mainly with respect to their cell surface. A thick cellulose layer present on the cell wall of S. ventriculi was not observed on the surface of S. maxima. Carbon replication indicated that the outer surface of S. ventriculi is rough in contour, probably as the r...

Recent studies identified c-di-GMP as a universal bacterial secondary messenger regulating biofilm formation, motility, production of extracellular polysaccharide and multicellular behavior in diverse bacteria. However, except for cellulose synthase, no protein has been shown to bind c-di-GMP and the targets for c-di-GMP action remain unknown. Here we report identification of the PilZ ("pills")...

Enzymatic degradation of plant biomass has attracted intensive research interest for the production of economically viable biofuels. Here we present an overview of the recent findings on biocatalysts implicated in the oxidative cleavage of cellulose, including polysaccharide monooxygenases (PMOs or LPMOs which stands for lytic PMOs), cellobiose dehydrogenases (CDHs) and members of carbohydrate-...

Coptotermes formosanus is one of the most destructive termites in the southern part of Japan as well as in the United States. Hemicellulose is a noncellulosic polysaccharide found in plant cell walls, and xylan is the major constituent of hemicellulose. Since hemicellulose prevents access of cellulolytic enzymes to cellulose, enzymatic hydrolysis of hemicellulose is beneficial for cellulose dig...

BACKGROUND Lytic polysaccharide monooxygenase (LPMO) is a group of recently identified proteins that catalyze oxidative cleavage of the glycosidic linkages of cellulose and other polysaccharides. By utilizing the oxidative mode of action, LPMOs are able to enhance the efficiency of cellulase in the hydrolysis of cellulose. Particularly, auxiliary activity family 9 (AA9) is a group of fungal LPM...

In 1957 Glaser (1) obtained a particulate fraction from Acetobatter xylinum which catalyzed the incorporation of the glucosyl moiety of uridine diphosphate n-glucose into cellulose. It seemed probable that this most important structural polysaccharide of higher plants was synthesized by a similar mechanism, but attempts to bring about its formation from uridine diphosphate u-glucose by enzyme s...

Thirty-seven bacterial strains capable of degrading peanut hull lignin were isolated by using four types of lignin preparations and hot-water-extracted peanut hulls. One of the isolates, tentatively identified as Arthrobacter sp., was capable of utilizing all four lignin preparations as well as extracted peanut hulls as a sole source of carbon. The bacterium was also capable of degrading specif...

The mucoadhesive disks of various polymers were fabricated with objective of comparing the mucoadhesive strength and mucoretentability with the isolated DPP. The mucoadhesive polymers used in formulations were sodium carboxy methyl cellulose, carbopol (cp934), hydroxyl propyl methyl cellulose (HPMC K4M), and date palm fruit pulp polysaccharide (DPP). These formulations were characterized for ph...