CHAPTER 16 Enzymes as direct decontaminating agents—mycotoxins Manjunath Manubolu 1 , Lavanya Goodla 2 , Kavitha Pathakoti 3 and Kjell Malmlo ¨f 4 1 The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, United States 2 Guangzhou Institutes of Biomedicine and Health, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Guangzhou, China 3 Jackson State University, Jackson, MS, United States 4 Swedish Farmers’ Foundation for Agricultural Research, Stockholm, Sweden 16.1 INTRODUCTION 16.1.1 ENZYMES AS DECONTAMINATING AGENTS Enzymes are biocatalysts that increase the rate of a reaction and accelerate the conversion of substrates into products that occur many millions of times faster by lowering the activation energy of the reaction. The active site (region) of the enzyme is directly involved in the catalytic process [1]. An enzyme may have one or more groups that are prerequisite for catalytic activity associated with the active sites through either covalent or noncovalent bonds. Being catalytic, the enzymes are immensely effective and can detoxify many times their own weight of agent in seconds or minutes. The biocatalytic nature and detoxification abilities of enzymes make them efficient decontamination agents [2]. The aim of decontamination technology progress efforts is to develop systems that are rapid and effective in detoxifying chemical and biological agents, are environmentally safe, that do not impact the operation effectiveness of the machinery being decontaminated, and minimize the procedural impact on opera- tions [3]. Unlike most chemical catalysts, different types of enzymes with differ- ent specificities can be mixed together in a single formulation. Because enzymes function excellently at near neutral pH, there are minor, if any, compatibility or corrosion concerns as long as the material being decontaminated can tolerate water. In a water-based system, there will not be any flammability concerns. Similar to enzymes in commercial laundry detergents, an enzyme-based deconta- minant, being biodegradable, will pose little or no health or environmental danger and leave no hazardous products that would need to be dealt with [4]. Potentially, an enzyme-based detoxifying agent will be favorable enough to be used directly on the skin of personnel and casualties. Another major advantage is Enzymes in Human and Animal Nutrition. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-12-805419-2.00016-2 © 2018 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. 313