AGIT PRATAMA

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INTRODUCTION TO BIOCHEMICAL ENGINEERING

PART A

1. Up-stream processing :
Blending, both of chemical and biological process in uniting different solution into one liquid
solution is the same way to homogenize the mixture. But in chemical reaction process, you
have to choose the right solvent or substance whether its volatile, viscous or solubility in
other hand, biological process we need to evaluated whether the blending can cause the
substrate become somewhat causing denaturation or even make the nutrient or organism
die.

Heat sterilization, in this process we have to set the proper temperature and pressure in
order to maintain the mixture whether it reach the optimum sterilization or not. But in
chemical process we need to consider how the mixture result after heating whether it will
evaporate because of high temperature above boiling point or it will cause the solution
mixture has low viscosity, in opposite we have to consider the substrate condition after
heating whether it will cause mixture cannot provide sufficient nutrient anymore or not or it
can affecting the cell growth.

Considering the particle size between biological and chemical process are the consent of air
filtration process, because both of the process also need pure air from the ambient air. But at
same purpose air filtration unit has to be cover some requirements for chemical process,
start from the polarity of air if the air is humid, we have to consider the filtrate polarity to be
able to adsorb at the filtrate or not, biological process considering on the particle size.

Inside the fermentation process both of the process are typically using catalyst to enhance
the production, but in biological fermentation usually done with fed-batch mode as glucose
must not be added in high amounts at the beginning of growth, in other word we have to
maintain the flow rate depending on chemical process we can simultaneously feeding with
steady flow rate from the start up process in order to give high conversion reactant.

Both of chemical and biological process deal with same solvent ability to dissolve, we have to
consider whether the solution will dissolve or not become an extractant. But we have to
choose a proper size of extractor in the process because it will affecting the microorganism
availability, comparing to the chemical process the extractor capacity is depend on volume of
our interest to place the mixture inside.

Downstream process:
Removal of biomass process is required to remove the biomass from culture, in biological
treatment we need to consider the impurities inside the mixture comparing to chemical
process we need to consider how the removal process could initiating other reaction to the
environment.
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INTRODUCTION TO BIOCHEMICAL ENGINEERING

Fluid bed drying process is necessary for each process to remove remaining moisture
present in the powdered penicillin salt. But in biological process its important to stabilizing
the material, does not carry pathogenic microorganism, does not emit odor easily and high
energy content. Different with chemical process we consider about the final conversion of
product whether it low or high efficiency.

Between chemical and biological process are meaning to have same purpose to place the
product inside but in case of high pressure, viscosity and volatility it must be the point of
consideration in using various type of storage whether it circular, tubular, or column to
maintain the product, comparing to the biological process we only consider whether the
condition of storage will cause the product quality low.
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INTRODUCTION TO BIOCHEMICAL ENGINEERING

2. a) The amino acid sequence or commonly known as primary structure is the structure which
contain both a basic amino group and an acidic carboxyl group, this allows the individual amino
acids to join together in long chains by forming peptide bonds. The molecular structure are
consist between NH2 of one amino acids and the COOH of another. But the sequence with
fewer than 50 amino acid are generally reffered to as peptides while term polypeptide or
protein are used for longer sequences.

The secondary structure is differ from it local conformation characteristic, which have two main
types of secondary structure known as -helix and -sheet. The Hydrogen bond that contain in
this -helix make this structure more stable. In other hand -sheet has the hydrogen bond
between the strands (inter-strand) it means that the hydrogen bonding is exist inside the strand
of a -sheet structure. The carbonyl oxygen in one strand hydrogen bond with the amino
hydrogens of the adjacent strand.

The tertiary structure formed by three-dimensional shape of all protein molecule. This
structure have a tendency to achieve maximum stability or lowest energy state by bend and
twist in such a way. Eventually, this kind of motion will cause the three-dimensional shape of a
protein or enzyme seem to be irregular and random, it is fashioned by many forces due to the
bonding interaction between the side-change groups of the amino acid. (Particle Sciences -
Technical Brief: 2009: Volume 8)

b) Enzyme is one of biocatalyst which have some characteristic to run only with specific
requirement. Every types of enzyme has their own shape that can only bind with a specific
substrate named active side, known that enzyme is working with only specific substrate. This
kind of active side fit with certain substrate with lock and key mode.

Absolute specificity which mean that enzyme only catalyse one reaction

Group specificity- the enzyme will act only on molecules that have specific functional groups

Linkage specificity - the enzyme will act on a particular type of chemical bond regardless of the
rest of the molecular structure

Stereochemical specificity - the enzyme will act on a particular steric or optical isomer.

c) Denaturation is the condition where the protein or enzyme which have their specific type loss
its structure by particular factors. Which mainly mention by cause of temperature and pH.

Enzyme work specific under certain range of temperature until it reach optimum temperature
the overheating will cause the molecular structure broke. In this case, each type of enzyme has
specific active side when the temperature too high then it will break down the active side so the
catalysis reaction will not occurs since no longer active sides existence, otherwise the substrate
would not linked with the enzyme anymore.
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INTRODUCTION TO BIOCHEMICAL ENGINEERING

Change in pH will affect the change the attraction between groups in the side chains of the
enzyme. The side chain of enzyme consist of several groups bonding such as Hydrogen and Salt
Bridge bonding. Salt bridges are ionic bonding, change in pH will cause the positive and negative
charge will immediately moving the structure into fit charge so the structure will change and
sometimes in higher or too low pH will disrupted the molecular structure of enzyme.