As a fundamental study on application of extracellular enzyme produced by animals and microorganisms to the removal of blood protein stains from fabrics, the influence of substrate specificity of protease and protease activity in a washing solution were studied using the fabrics soiled with bovine blood (whole blood, defibrinated blood, blood plasma and blood serum) .
The blood protein stains, which adhered to the fabrics in a state of coagulation with blood serum, denatured as the days left at room increased and gradually became insoluble, and as a result it became very difficult to remove the blood protein stains from fabrics compared with other water-soluble protein stains. However, when alkaline protease produced by
Bacillus subtilisin var. having a wide range of substrate specificity and neutral or alkaline protease produced by
Aspergillus oryzaecausing a decrease in viscosity of gelatin solution were used, the detergency of blood protein stains were remarkably high. Especially, the removal efficiency of blood serum protein stains which have low dissolubility or dispersive power into water increased more than 50-60% when the washing solution of protease activity over 25 PU/ml were used.
The fibrinogen contained in whole blood and blood plasma caused the decrease of solubility into water of these protein stains on the fabrics. And generally the removal efficiency of these blood protein stains containing fibrinogen decreased compared with that of stains without fibrinogen when protease was used.
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