Department of Biotechnology and Molecular Biology, Aksaray University, 68100 Aksaray, Turkey.
Department of Biology, Vytautas Magnus University, LT-44404 Kaunas, Lithuania; Institute of Biology and Plant Biotechnology, Faculty of Agronomy, Aleksandras Stulginskis University, LT-53361 Akademija, Kaunas Region, Lithuania.
Int J Biol Macromol. 2015 Aug;79:126-32. doi: 10.1016/j.ijbiomac.2015.04.066. Epub 2015 May 2.
Chitin immediately suggests the representatives of the kingdom Fungi, as well as such phyla as Annelida, Mollusca, Porifera, Cnidaria and, mostly, Arthropoda. Although Bryozoa also represents a chitin-containing phylum, no study has been developed yet on the isolation or characterization of the chitin from it. In this study, physiochemical properties of the chitin isolated from Plumatella repens belonging to the phylum Bryozoa was determined for the first time. The chitin structure was also studied comparatively by isolating chitin from an insect species (Palomena prasina) of the phylum Arthropoda, and Fomes fomentarius belonging to the kingdom Fungi. It was observed that the bryozoan chitin was in the α form, as in the arthropod and fungal chitins. The chitin contents in the dry weight of the bryozoan, fungal and insect species were observed to be 13.3%, 2.4%, and 10.8%, respectively. The insect chitin exhibited the highest thermal stability followed by that of the bryozoan and then the fungal chitins. Surface morphologies reveal that the insect and bryozoan chitins were composed of nano fibre and pore structures, whereas the fungal chitin had no pores or fibres. The crystallinity of the insect chitin (CrI=84.9%) was higher than the bryozoan (CrI=60.1%) and fungal chitins (CrI=58.5%).
几丁质立即让人联想到真菌界的代表，以及环节动物门、软体动物门、多孔动物门、刺胞动物门，以及大多数节肢动物门。尽管苔藓动物门也是一个含有几丁质的门，但迄今为止尚未对其几丁质的分离或特性进行研究。在这项研究中，首次确定了属于苔藓动物门的 Plumatella repens 中分离出的几丁质的物理化学性质。还通过从节肢动物门（Palomena prasina）的昆虫物种和真菌界的 Fomes fomentarius 中分离几丁质，比较研究了几丁质的结构。观察到苔藓动物门的几丁质呈α形式，与节肢动物和真菌的几丁质相同。在干燥重量中，苔藓动物门、真菌和昆虫物种的几丁质含量分别为 13.3%、2.4%和 10.8%。昆虫几丁质表现出最高的热稳定性，其次是苔藓动物门的几丁质，然后是真菌的几丁质。表面形貌表明，昆虫和苔藓动物门的几丁质由纳米纤维和孔结构组成，而真菌几丁质没有孔或纤维。昆虫几丁质的结晶度（CrI=84.9%）高于苔藓动物门（CrI=60.1%）和真菌几丁质（CrI=58.5%）。
