$850,000 Funding For Enzyme Research

11 September 2013

$850,000 Funding For Enzyme Research

A research grant of $850,000 has brought the production of new enzymes for commercial use one step closer.

University of Waikato Biological Sciences Professor Vic Arcus, head of a group of 12 researchers, has been awarded $850,000 for a two-year project to develop a new method for designing “next-generation enzymes” for commercial use.

The grant is part of the University’s $5 million research funding allocated in the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment’s 2013 science investment round.

“Research funding is very competitive so when you get a grant like this, it’s a very exciting day,” says Professor Arcus.

The project, which gets underway in mid-October, aims to develop enzymes for commercial use in three main applications: in the manufacturing of biofuels, forensics and diagnostics, and in the manufacturing of chemically complex drugs for the pharmaceutical industry.

Professor Arcus says the new research is a continuation of an earlier Marsden-funded project, “and grew out of our interest in the fundamental properties of enzymes, particularly in their evolution”.

The research team for this project includes Professor Arcus, Waikato University Post-Doctoral Fellow Dr Joanne Hobbs, Professor Emily Parker from the University of Canterbury, Dr Wayne Patrick from the University of Otago and Dr Dave Saul from Hamilton biotechnology company ZyGEM. Research will be conducted at ZyGEM and in laboratories at the three universities.

Dr Hobbs says the group will be taking information from existing enzymes found in organisms, and using that information to design new enzymes.

“We’ve already had success with developing new enzymes,” she says. “Now we want to develop enzymes that are 10 times faster and 100 times more stable for commercial use.”

Enzymes are biological catalysts that speed up chemical reactions. They are added to substances such as laundry powder to increase the efficiency of that product.

“If you put maltose in water, it takes 1.4 million years to breakdown, but if you add an enzyme, it only takes 1.4 seconds,” says Professor Arcus.

It is this type of enzyme use that the group is looking to make commercially viable by its research work. Professor Arcus says that while the global enzyme industry is enormous, it has yet to be developed in this country.

“With our research, we hope to contribute to a fledgling, high-value enzyme industry in New Zealand,” he says

Professor Vic Arcus with Dr Jo Hobbs and screen image of MalL, the enzyme that converts maltose into glucose in 1.4 seconds.

ENDS

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