Immobilized enzymes - A simple calorimetric method for the determination of the catalytic activity

The results communicated in this paper show that rapid and reliable information about the activity of immobilized enzymes follows from calorimetric measurements. The study was done using spherical and plain carriers as well as different enzymes (urease, glucose-oxidase, invertase). The enzyme thermistor developed by Danielsson et al. was used as a measuring system. This measuring system was applied to investigate the activity of enzyme carrier complexes produced by the sol-gel technique. The influence of processing parameters could be pointed out at complexes of different forms (xerogel, gel on ceramic carrier, thin gel layers on foil, etc.). With the described calorimetric method, a fast and reliable technique for comparative determination of the activity of immobilized enzymes is available. A special advantage of this method is its variability in carriers and the generally applicable thermal measuring principle. Therefore, it seems useful for the development of new immobilization techniques. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science B.V.