Abstract
Brown rot basidiomycetes are a principal group of wood-decaying fungi which degrade wood cellulose and hemicellulose by the combination of carbohydrate active enzymes and non-enzymatic oxidation reactions. Very scant information is available on carbohydrate active enzymes of brown rot fungi. In this context, present study focused on the production of cellulolytic-hemicellulolytic enzymes from newly isolated brown rot Fomitopsis meliae CFA 2. Under solid-state fermentation using wheat bran as the substrate Fomitopsis meliae CFA 2 was able to produce a maximum of 1391.12 ± 21.13 U/g of endoglucanase along with other cellulolytic and hemicellulolytic enzymes. Various fermentation parameters were optimised for enhanced production of endoglucanase by employing Plackett-Burman design followed by Box-Behnken design. A well-fitted regression equation with R(2) value of 98.91% was attained for endoglucanase. The yield of endoglucanase was enhanced by 1.83-fold after executing statistical optimisation of various fermentative parameters. The newly isolated Fomitopsis meliae CFA 2 was found to be a potential producer of endoglucanase. Enzymatic saccharification of alkali-treated wheat straw and rice straw resulted in release of 190.8 and 318.8 mg/g of reducing sugars, respectively.