In mammals, the enzymatic degradation of HA results from the action of three types of enzymes: hyaluronidase (hyase), b-d-glucuronidase, and β-N acetyl-hexosaminidase. Throughout the body, these enzymes are found in various forms, intracellularly
and in serum. In general, hyase cleaves high molecular weight HA into smaller oligosaccharides while β-d-glucuronidase and β-N-acetylhexosaminidase
further degrade the oligosaccharide fragments by removing nonreducing terminal sugars (Leach and Schmidt, 2004).