Detection of a staphylococcal endo-β-N-acetylglucosaminidase using polyacrylamide gels

Abstract An activity gel method has been developed for the detection of bacteriolytic enzymes. After gel electrophoresis of the enzymes in the presence of SDS, enzyme activity was seen in the gel as a transparent band resulting from bacteriolysis in the gels containing bacterial cells. Staphylococcal endo- β - N -acetylglucosaminidase, as a model enzyme, was employed to see the analytical advantage of this method relative to the turbidimetric method. This activity gel method detects in the order of 100 pg of staphylococcal endo- β - N -acetylglucosaminidase. The method is simple to use, very sensitive and applicable to renaturable bacteriolytic enzymes.