Comprehensive review of enzyme immobilization in industry: applications, advantages, and challenges

Abstract

Enzymes bring lots of energetical, environmental and economic advantages that are obfuscating the vision of classical chemistry. Since enzymes are susceptible to destabilizing under industrial harsh conditions, industrial feasibility of enzyme use relies on making enzymes stronger and more active under such environments. Thus, catalytic chemistry has taken the path of conjugating enzymes with other molecules or surfaces that give new characteristics to render them more stable and, sometimes, even more active with respect to the original form. The mechanisms underlying enzyme conformational changes and their correlation with activity have yet to be unveiled, but recent research has shed some light on how intermolecular and intramolecular interactions combined with immobilization techniques govern enzyme thermodynamics and kinetics. Thus, harnessing such knowledge can potentially give us a roadmap to ensure enzyme effectiveness in ubiquitous industrial sectors, such as food and pharmaceutics. In short, enzyme immobilization can be the cornerstone that might impulse a new generation of biochemical synthesis in industry which is the greenest and most efficient ever utilized up until now.