Potential of cholinium glycinate for the extraction of extremophilic lipolytic biocatalysts

[Display omitted] •N1112OHGly involves great biphasic regions in aqueous solutions of Triton surfactants.•Temperature increase and low HLB value of surfactant maximize immiscibility window.•N1112OHGly ionic liquid is a suitable salting out agent for extremozymes separation. This work is the first approach to extract extremozymes from aqueous media containing non-ionic surfactants. A biocompatible ionic liquid like cholinium glycinate ([N1112OH][Gly]) has been selected as phase forming agent in aqueous solutions of Triton X surfactants at several temperatures. Then, two in-house synthesized extremophilic lipolytic enzymes (one from Halomonas sp. LM1C, HspL, and one from Thermus thermophilus HB27, TtL) were targeted in order to investigate the extraction capacity of the proposed strategy. It was concluded that the cautious selection of the feed concentration at a given tie-line allowed an efficient extraction of the thermophilic lipolytic enzyme TtL without losing its biocatalytic potential. Thus, protein extraction levels reached about 98% and the activity percentages were near 100%, which clearly surpasses the performance of the commercial lipase from Candida rugosa (CrL). In summary, the glycinate-based ionic liquid can concomitantly be proposed as competitive extraction agent and neoteric medium for biocatalytic reactions.