Zinc Oxide Nanoparticles Supported Lipase Immobilization for Biotransformation in Organic Solvents: A Facile Synthesis of Geranyl Acetate, Effect of Operative Variables and Kinetic Study

The present study describes grafting of zinc oxide (ZnO) nanoparticles with polyethyleneimine (PEI) followed by modification with glutraldehyde used as the bridge for binding the enzyme to support. The prepared nanocomposites were then characterized using Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, thermogravimetric analysis, and transmission electron microscopy, utilized for synthesis of geranyl acetate in n-hexane. Among all the three prepared nanocomposites (ZnO + PEI, ZnO + PEI + SAA, ZnO + PEI + GLU), Candida rugosa lipase immobilized on ZnO-PEI-GLU was found to be best for higher ester synthesis. The operating conditions that maximized geranyl acetate resulted in the highest yield of 94 % in 6 h, molar ratio of 0.1:0.4 M (geraniol/vinyl acetate) in the presence of n-hexane as reaction medium. Various kinetic parameters such as V max , K i ( G ) , K m ( G ) , and K m ( VA ) were determined using nonlinear regression analysis for order bi–bi mechanism. The kinetic study showed that reaction followed order bi–bi mechanism with inhibition by geraniol. Activation energy ( E a ) was found to be lower for immobilized lipase (12.31 kJ mol −1 ) than crude lipase (19.04 kJ mol −1 ) indicating better catalytic efficiency of immobilized lipase. Immobilized biocatalyst demonstrated 2.23-fold increased catalytic activity than crude lipase and recycled 20 times. The studies revealed in this work showed a promising perspective of using low-cost nanobiocatalysts to overcome the well-known drawbacks of the chemical-catalyzed route.