A potent bacterium for extracellular protease production was isolated from local soil and identified as Pseudomonas sp. RAJR 044. A mutant of this strain JNGR 242 with protease productivity 2.5 fold higher was obtained by ultraviolet irradiation under experimentally optimized conditions of pH 7.0, temperature of 34ºC, inoculum volume of 1.0 mL and incubation time of 24 hours. Comparative analysis of the chemical characteristics i.e. assimilation of carbon and nitrogen sources were also carried out. Maximum growth of the mutant strain in 2% gelatin agar plate was obtained in presence of dextrose (2%), maltose (2%), ammonium sulfate (2%) and potassium nitrate (2%) whereas, that of the parent strain was found in sucrose (2%) and ammonium nitrate (2%). The purified proteases from both the strains (parent and mutant) appeared as single homogeneous bands corresponding to 14.4 kDa molecular weight on SDS-PAGE. On studying the kinetic properties of both strains it was observed that the rate of casein hydrolysis was maximum at pH 8.0 and 7.0 and temperatures 45º C and 60º C for the parent and mutant strains respectively. It was also observed that both the extracellular proteases were inhibited by a serine protease inhibitor i.e. PMSF at 2mM concentration.
Extracellular protease; Purification; Kinetic characterization; Ultraviolet mutagenesis; Pseudomonas sp.; Physicochemical
