Enzymatic synthesis and structural characterization of theanderose through transfructosylation reaction catalyzed by levansucrase from Bacillus subtilis CECT 39

This work addresses the high-yield and fast enzymatic production of theanderose, a naturally-occurring carbohydrate, also known as isomaltosucrose, whose chemical structure determined by NMR is α-D-glucopyranosyl-(1→6)-α-D-glucopyranosyl-(1→2)-β-D-fructofuranose. The ability of isomaltose to act as an acceptor in the Bacillus subtilis CECT 39 levansucrase-catalyzed transfructosylation reaction to efficiently produce theanderose in the presence of sucrose as a donor is described by using four different sucrose:isomaltose concentration ratios. The maximum theanderose concentration ranged from 122.4 to 130.4 gL-1, was obtained after only 1 hour and at a moderate temperature (37°C), leading to high productivity (109.7-130.4 gL-1h-1) and yield (up to 37.3%) values. The enzymatic synthesis was highly regiospecific, since no other detectable acceptor reaction products were formed. The development of efficient and cost-effective procedures for the biosynthesis of unexplored but appealing oligosaccharides as poten...