Liquid-liquid extraction by reversed micelles in biotechnological processes

Abstract

In biotechnology there is a need for new purification and concentration processes for biologically active compounds such as proteins, enzymes, nucleic acids, or cells that combine a high selectivity and biocompatibility with an easy scale-up. A liquid-liquid extraction with a reversed micellar phase might serve these purposes owing to its capacity to solubilize specific biomolecules from dilute aqueous solutions such as fermentation and cell culture media. Reversed micelles are aggregates of surfactant molecules containing an inner core of water molecules, dispersed in a continuous organic solvent medium. These reversed micelles are capable of selectively solubilizing polar compounds in an apolar solvent. This review gives an overview of liquid-liquid extraction by reversed micelles for a better understanding of this process

Evaluation of solubility and partition properties of ampicillin-based ionic liquids

“…This mechanism leads to the formation of larger micelles. Another factor that influences the CMC values is the nature of the anion (Kilikian et al, 2000).…”

Influence of salts on the coexistence curve and protein partitioning in nonionic aqueous two-phase micellar systems

“…Liquidliquid extraction is a promising technique that can possibly be used instead of, or as a complementary process to more typical chromatographic operations in order to reduce the costs of downstream processing of different molecules (Kilikian et al, 2000;Mazzola et al, 2006;Hebbar et al, 2012;Lopes et al, 2014).…”

Preliminary Characterization of Xylose Reductase Partially Purified by Reversed Micelles from <i>Candida tropicalis</i> IEC5-ITV, an Indigenous Xylitol-Producing Strain

“…This method involves the use of ternary mixtures composed of water-surfactant-solvent which in a first step (forward extraction), through agitation, leads to the aggregation of surfactant molecules that form a hydrophilic core (reverse micelles) where the enzyme to be purified can be integrated. In a second step (backward extraction), through its transfer to a new aqueous phase the enzyme of the reverse micelles is released, so that a quantitative recovery of purified protein is observed [1]. The extraction of enzymes by reverse micelles has been demonstrated for a number of enzymes in various reverse micelles systems: porcine pepsin and bovine chymosin [2], alcohol dehydrogenase [3], xylanase [4], β xylosidase [5], glucose oxidase [6], nattokinase [7], xylitol dehydrogenase [8,9] and xylose reductase [9][10][11].…”