Research Article
Sajith S, Priji P, Sreedevi
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.