Three-phase partitioning for simultaneous renaturation and partial purification of Aspergillus niger xylanase

Three-phase partitioning (TPP) is carried out by mixing ammonium sulfate and t-butanol to obtain organic phase, interfacial precipitate and aqueous phase. It is shown that TPP of an 8 M urea/100 mM dithiothreitol-denatured xylanase preparation resulted in simultaneous renaturation and purification. This integrated novel approach gave recovery of 93% enzyme activity with 21-fold purification. The implications of this in the context of recovering activity from inclusion bodies are discussed.