Tentacle carrier for immobilization of potato phenoloxidase and its application for halogenophenols removal from aqueous solutions

Halogenated compounds represent one of the most dangerous environmental pollutants, due to their widespread usage as biocides, fungicides, disinfectants, solvent and other industrial chemicals. Immobilization of a protein through coordinate bonds formed with divalent metal ions is becoming an attractive method due to its reversible nature, since the protein may be easily removed from the support matrix through interruption of the protein-metal bond hence giving inherently cleaner and cheaper technology for wastewater treatment. We have synthesized novel 'tentacle' carrier (TC) and used it for immobilization of partially purified potato polyphenol oxidase (PPO). The obtained biocatalyst TC-PPO showed pH optimum at 7.0-8.0 and temperature optimum at 25 °C. Immobilized PPO shows almost 100% of activity at 0 °C. TC-PPO was more resistant to the denaturation induced by sodium dodecyl sulphate (SDS) detergent as compared to its soluble counterpart and was even slightly activated at SDS concentration of 1%.TC-PPO was tested in the batch reactor for 4-chlorophenol and 4-bromophenol removal. More than 90% removal was achieved for both halogenophenols at concentration of 100 mg/L from aqueous solution. For both halogenophenols TC-PPO works with over 90% removal during first three cycles which decrease to 60% removal efficiency after six cycles each of 8 h duration.