Dr. Vijay Chintaman Sonawane

Biography

Microbial diversity offers opportunities to find new sources of industrially important enzymes and new bioactive molecules. New enzymes are required to carry out desired bioconversion or biotransformation reaction. Enzymes are being explored to replace or to modify existing chemical processes in which, hazardous reagents are used and toxic waste is produced. Enzymes for a specific reaction can be found by screening microbes using a suitable assay A novel bacterial strain belonging to the genus Bacilus was screened. Glutaryl-7-ACA acylase has been isolated, purified and characterized. The enzyme isolated and purified from the novel strain can be used for the conversion of GL-7-ACA acylase to 7-ACA. D-amino acid oxidase which, converts cephalosporin C into GL-7-ACA is labile enzyme. A method for stabilization of D-amino acid oxidase was developed. Discovery of novel bioactive molecules for pharmaceutical drug development involve use of screens which enables screening of desired type of bioactive molecules. However most of such screens are patented and highly guarded in the field of drug discovery. Commercial types of screens are prohibitively expensive. Development of novel screens is an important activity where microbial diversity can be exploited. Development of novel assays for screening of specific type of anticancer drug and multiple drug resistance pump molecules is being done. Laccase (Polyphenol oxidase) have emerged as the versatile enzyme for Bioremediation purpose. Through screening microbial diversity several potent laccase producing strains have been isolated, A novel laccase from sp. has been isolated and characterized. It is able to decolorize several textile dyes including Triphenylmethane dyes and Azo dyes. Arthrographis Selected list of Publications and Patents: Publications: Sonawane, V.C., Jolly, R. S. and Vohra, R.M. (1996) Cephalosporin modification: An extra cellular glutaryl-7-ACA acylase from Bacillus sp. Biotech. Letts.18, 965. Sonawane, V.C. and Vohra R.M (1996) Characterization of a new extra-cellular Cephalosporin acylase from Bacillus sp. Proceedings of Intnl. Symposium on Recent Adv. Bioindustry, Seoul, Korea.57-61 Sonawane, V.C. (2005) A mini-scale method for assay of D-amino acid oxidase activity in Trigonopsis variabilis against cephalosporin C. Biocatalysis Biotransformation 23,117-121. Sonawane, V.C. (2006) Enzymatic modifications of cephalosporins by cephalosporin acylase and other enzymes. Crit. Review. Biotechnol. 26(2), 95-120. Patents: Sonawane V.C. and Vohra ,R. Indian Patent No. 184693. Title: ‘‘A process for the preparation of cephalosporin acylase’’. Sonawane V.C. Indian patent No. 194298. Title: ‘‘A method for stabilization of whole cell biocatalyst’’. Sonawane V.C. International patent application on ‘ Novel laccase enzyme and its applications’ (2009).

Research Interest

Applied Microbiology including screening, fermentation, enzyme technology and bioremediation.