title: Advances in protease engineering for laundry detergents.
abstract: Proteases are essential ingredients in modern laundry detergents. Over the past 30 years, subtilisin proteases employed in the laundry detergent industry have been engineered by directed evolution and rational design to tailor their properties towards industrial demands. This comprehensive review discusses recent success stories in subtilisin protease engineering. Advances in protease engineering for laundry detergents comprise simultaneous improvement of thermal resistance and activity at low temperatures, a rational strategy to modulate pH profiles, and a general hypothesis for how to increase promiscuous activity towards the production of peroxycarboxylic acids as mild bleaching agents. The three protease engineering campaigns presented provide in-depth analysis of protease properties and have identified principles that can be applied to improve or generate enzyme variants for industrial applications beyond laundry detergents.
authors.affiliation: RWTH Aachen University, Worringerweg 3, D-52074 Aachen, Germany.
authors.forename: Ljubica
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Vojcic
authors.affiliation: RWTH Aachen University, Worringerweg 3, D-52074 Aachen, Germany.
authors.forename: Christian
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Pitzler
authors.affiliation: RWTH Aachen University, Worringerweg 3, D-52074 Aachen, Germany.
authors.forename: Georgette
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Körfer
authors.affiliation: DWI - Leibniz Institute for Interactive Materials, Forckenbeckstraße 50, D-52074 Aachen, Germany.
authors.forename: Felix
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Jakob
authors.affiliation: RWTH Aachen University, Worringerweg 3, D-52074 Aachen, Germany; EW-Nutrition GmbH, Enzyme Technology, Nattermannallee 1, D-50829 Köln, Germany.
authors.lastname: Ronny Martinez
authors.affiliation: AB Enzymes GmbH, Feldbergstraße 78, D-64293 Darmstadt, Germany.
authors.forename: Karl-Heinz
authors.initials: KH
authors.lastname: Maurer
authors.affiliation: RWTH Aachen University, Worringerweg 3, D-52074 Aachen, Germany; DWI - Leibniz Institute for Interactive Materials, Forckenbeckstraße 50, D-52074 Aachen, Germany. Electronic address: u.schwaneberg@biotec.rwth-aachen.de.
authors.forename: Ulrich
authors.initials: U
authors.lastname: Schwaneberg
mesh_terms: D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D003902:Detergents / Q000138:chemical synthesis*; D004789:Enzyme Activation; D004795:Enzyme Stability; D006863:Hydrogen-Ion Concentration; D007846:Laundering / Q000379:methods*; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D010447:Peptide Hydrolases / Q000737:chemistry* / Q000235:genetics*; D015202:Protein Engineering / Q000379:methods*; D013379:Substrate Specificity; D020860:Subtilisin / Q000737:chemistry*; D013696:Temperature
chemical_list: D003902:Detergents; D010447:Peptide Hydrolases; D020860:Subtilisin