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Abstract:
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The microorganisms are recognized as important sources of protease
inhibitors which are valuable in the fields of medicine, agriculture and
biotechnology. The protease inhibitors of microbial origin are found to be versatile
in their structure and mode of inhibition that vary from those of other sources.
Although surplus of low molecular weight non-protein protease inhibitors from
microorganisms have been reported, there is a dearth of reports on proteinaceous
protease inhibitors. The search for new metabolites from marine organisms has
resulted in the isolation of more or less 10,000 metabolites (Fuesetani and
Fuesetani, 2000) many of which are gifted with pharmacodynamic properties. The
existence of marine microorganisms was reported earlier, and they were found to
be metabolically and physiologically dissimilar from terrestrial microorganisms.
Marine microorganisms have potential as important new sources of enzyme
inhibitors and consequently a detailed study of new marine microbial inhibitors
will provide the basis for future research (Imada, 2004). |