Full Length Research Paper

Transforming p-coumaric acid into p-hydroxybenzoic acid by the mycelial culture of a white rot fungus Schizophyllum commune

Ashish Sachan^1,2*, Shashwati Ghosh^1,2 and Adinpunya Mitra¹

¹Natural Product Biotechnology Group, Agricultural and Food Engineering Department, Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur, Kharagpur - 721 302, India.

²Department of Biotechnology, Birla Institute of Technology, Mesra, Ranchi - 835 215, Jharkhand, India.

*Corresponding author. E-mail: asachan@bitmesra.ac.in. Tel: +91-0651-2276223(O).Fax: +91-0651- 227540

Accepted 17 December, 2009

   Abstract

The aim of this paper was to study the catabolic product(s) of p-coumaric acid by a white rot fungus, Schizophyllum commune. TLC and HPLC chromatogram showed that p-hydroxybenzoic acid was formed as a major degradation product of p-coumaric acid. The purity of p-hydroxybenzoic acid was further confirmed by mass spectrometry. A maximum amount 2.5 mg/l of p-hydroxybenzoic acid was detected in the culture medium on 12^th day of incubation using 5.0 mM p-coumaric acid as sole source of carbon. It was assumed that during the process of p-coumaric acid degradation, p-hydroxybenzaldehyde was produced as an unstable intermediate, which was rapidly converted into p-hydroxybenzoic acid and accumulated in the media. An indication of a very slow reverse conversion, that is, p-hydroxybenzoic acid into p-hydroxybenzaldehyde was also traced.

Key words: p-coumaric acid, Schizophyllum commune, p-hydroxybenzoic acid.