Published Paper Details:

The biodegradation of cellulose under the influence of the polyenzymatic cellulase complex is a fairly involved biochemical process. Its effectiveness is dependent primarily on the composition and properties of cellulose preparations, the structure of substrate, the conditions under which reactions are carried out and the concentration of the hydrolytic products, accumulating in the reaction system. Availability of water is the most important parameter for enzymatic activity of the cellulase. Only a few species among the fungi are able to germinate and grow at water activity value of the substrate below 0.8. As such, commercial textile laundering and dry cleaning stuffs report an increase in fungal damage, mainly caused by damp storage condition. The present work deals with the isolation and Characterization of a cellulose - degrading enzyme from ascomycetes fungus, Neurospora crassa. This mutant carrying deletions of two genes encoding extracellular beta- glucosidase lacks beta- glucosidase activity, but efficiently induces cellulase gene expression in the presence of cellobiose, cellotriose or cellotetraose as a sole carbon source.