Highly active and stable nanobiocatalyst based on in-situ cross-linking of phospholipase D for the synthesis of phosphatidylserine.

Phospholipase D (PLD) was effectively immobilized on a ZnO nanowires/macroporous SiO composite support through an in-situ cross-linking method. An anionic and long-chained bi-epoxy cross-linker was used by adsorbing on the surface of ZnO nanowires through static interaction before cross-linking. Under the fine control of in-situ cross-linking the immobilized PLD has loading amount as high as 113.7 mg/g, possessing high specific activity from 13,987 to 16,142 U/g in all the range of loading amount. The immobilized PLD showed high activity and stability in catalyzing the conversion of phosphatidylcholine (PC) to phosphatidylserine (PS). The reaction conditions such as loading amount of PLD, substrate molar ratio, temperature, solution pH, and reaction time were optimized for the finding of best synthetic process. Under optimized conditions and the PS yield reached 94.8% within 40 min at 50 °C. The immobilized PLD exhibited not only better thermostability and resistance to pH inactivation than free PLD but also the greatly improved storage stability and reusability. It was found that 81.5% of initial activity retained after incubation at 4 °C for 60 days and that 80.4% of PS yield retained after 13 cycling reuses.