Abstract:
Amylase is an enzyme that hydrolyzes of starch into reducing sugars and can be produced
from the fermentation process by several microorganisms, including the thermophilic
fungus of Aspergillus sp. LBKURCC304. Thermophilic fungi have an advantage in
production of amylase enzyme because they can live at high temperature, so the metabolites
such as enzymes and proteins that resulted will be more resistant to high temperature.
Based on previous studies, Aspergillus sp. LBKURCC304 has been isolated and produced
amylase enzyme qualitatively at 50oC, but quantitative enzyme production has never been
done. The purpose of this study was to production of amylase enzyme quantitatively from
this isolate, like the optimum activity from amylase crude extract and protein content as
well as the optimum amylase specific activity produced every day for 18 days of the
fermentation process at 50oC. Nelson-Somogyi and Lowry method were used to determine
the enzyme activity and the protein content, respectively. Specific activity was obtained by
dividing the amylase enzyme activity with the protein content. The results obtained were
analyzed using the Anova and Duncan test. Result for the highest enzyme activity was
obtained on the 11th day at 0,0302±0,0041 U/mL, optimum protein content was obtained
on the 7th day at 2,2821±0,0632 mg/mL, while the highest specific activity was produced
on the 11th day, with 0,0214±0,0005 U/mg. One unit of amylase enzyme activity is defined
as the amount of enzyme needed to produce 1 μmol of reducing sugar per minute at 50oC
with pH 7.
