Bioconversion of Iminodiacetonitrile to Iminodiacetic acid with whole cells of Lysinibacillus boronitolerans MTCC 107614 (IICT-akl252)

Biotechnological potential of nitrilases are prompting significant interest in finding the novel microbes capable of hydrolyzing nitriles. In this view, we have screened about 450 bacterial strains for nitrilase production using bioconversion of iminodiacetonitrile (IDAN) to iminodiacetic acid (IDA) through hydrolysis and obtained six nitrilase-producing isolates. Among these six isolates, IICT-akl252 was promising which was identified as Lysinibacillus boronitolerans. This is the first report on L. boronitolerans for nitrilase activity. Optimization of various medium and reaction parameters for maximizing the nitrilase production using whole cells in shake flask was carried out for L. boronitolerans IICT-akl252. Sucrose (2 %) as a carbon source attained better nitrilase yield while IDAN appeared to be the preferable inducer (0.2 %). The maximum IDA formation was achieved with 100 mM IDAN and 150 mg/ml cells at 30 °C and pH 6.5. After optimization of the culture and reaction conditions, the activity of nitrilase was increased by 2.3-fold from 27.2 to 64.5 U. The enzyme was stable up to 1 h at 50 °C. The enzyme was able to hydrolyze aliphatic, aromatic and heterocyclic nitrile substrates.