An Overview on Fungal Cellulases with an Industrial Perspective

Abstract

Lignocellulose is the most abundant biopolymer available on earth. Hydrolysis of lignocellulose into fermentable sugars, sugar acids and phenolics is the pre-requisite for its successful exploitation as substrates for the large scale production of industrially significant value added products. Though remarkable collection of lignocellulolytic microorganisms has been brought to limelight, only a few especially fungi have been studied extensively as they secrete copious lignocellulolytic enzymes extracellularly. Enzymatic hydrolysis of lignocelluloses is carried out by a group of enzymes viz., cellulases, hemicellulases, ligninases in unison or individually, and are collectively known as lignocellulolytic enzymes. In this light of this background, followed by a short introduction on lignocellulose, lignocellulolytic enzymes and mainly focused on fungal cellulase, this review discusses recent approaches on the production of cellulase by submerged and solid-state fermentation strategies; current knowledge on the purification, characterisation of cellulase; and finally concluded with detailed industrial applications of fungal cellulase