Biologically inspired laccase-mimicking OVA-Cu complex for degradation of organic dye pollutant: Artificial neural network modeling and optimization.

INTRODUCTION

Enzyme-mimic nanomaterials, or nanozymes, have received much attention in fundamental and practical research. Laccases are crucial for environmental remediation and biotechnology. Inspired by the structure of the active site and the electron transfer mechanism of laccase, a simple laccase-like platform was designed in this work.

METHODS

In this work, ovalbumin (OVA) was isolated and purified from hen egg white and conjugated with the transition metal ion (Cu), resulting in a soluble biopolymer (OVA‒Cu complex). Using a colorimetric method based on guaiacol oxidation, the catalytic performance of the complex was assessed, and its laccase‒like activity was verified.

RESULTS

The kinetic parameters ( and values) of the laccase‒mimic complex were calculated to be 0.026 mM and 0.7 μM min, respectively. The prepared complex showed excellent catalytic activity with a similar value to the natural laccase enzyme at the same mass concentration. Analysis of the synthesized system's capacity to decolorize malachite green (MG) showed its strong decolorizing potential. The outcomes demonstrated that MG can be degraded up to 84% in the presence of the OVA‒Cu complex in one hour. The decolorization metabolites were tested for toxicity against and . The results demonstrated that less hazardous metabolites were produced after degrading MG by the OVA‒Cu complex. In addition, a 5:3:1 artificial neural network (ANN) was created to predict the decolorization efficiency (DE (%)) of MG.

CONCLUSION

Based on these results, it is evident that the OVA‒Cu complex has the potential to take the role of natural laccases in a variety of biosensing, environmental protection, and biotechnology applications.