3.3. Enzyme properties
In order to assess what type of enzyme we were dealing with,
fructofuranosidase or fructosyl transferase, a series of experiments
were carried out involving sucrose conversion and FOS
production. Considering the enzyme activities with 2% and
50% sucrose and with 2% inulin 2 (Table 2), and analysing
for oligosaccharide production (Figs. 4–7), it was possible to
determine important enzyme characteristics. As can be seen
in Table 2, all the enzymes showed higher fructofuranosidase
activities with 2% sucrose and some inhibitory effects could be
noticed with 50% sucrose.
Hidaka et al. [13] showed that the greater the ratio between
the fructosyl transferase and hydrolytic activities, the greater the
production of FOS, and only enzymes with high ratios between
the activities were able to produce FOS at low sucrose concentration
(5.0% and 0.5%). They also showed that enzymes with
lower ratios between the activities, had hydrolytic activity for the
FOS, and consequently all the fructooligosaccharide