© 2016 George Aldous Jenin et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License -NonCommercial- ShareAlike Unported License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/ ). Journal of Applied Biology & Biotechnology Vol. 4 (03), pp. 001-005, May-June, 2016 Available online at http://www.jabonline.in DOI: 10.7324/JABB.2016.40301 Isolation and Identification of Chitinase Producing Native Fungi From Saltpan of Puthalam, Kanyakumari District, Tamil Nadu, India George Aldous Jenin 1 , Mariavincent Michael Babu 2 , Manavalan Murugan 3 , Thanigaimalai Murugan 3* 1 Department of Biochemistry, Lekshmipuram College of Arts and Science, Neyyoor- 629 252, Tamil Nadu, India. 2 Centre for Marine Science and Technology, Manonmaniam Sundaranar University, Rajakkamangalam – 629 502, Tamil Nadu, India. 3 Centre for Biological Science, Noorul Islam Centre for Higher Education, Kumaracoil- 629 180, Tamil Nadu, India. ARTICLE INFO ABSTRACT Article history: Received on: 13/04/2016 Revised on: 04/05/2016 Accepted on: 27/05/2016 Available online: 21/06/2016 The objective of the present study is isolation and identification of native chitinolytic fungal strains from infected Artemia collected for salt pan of Puthalam, Kanyakumari District, Tamil Nadu. A total of 10 fungi (J1 to J10) were isolated from homogenized Artemia sample and screened for chitinase activity on chitin agar plates. In this study, 5 fungi (J1, J3, J4, J5, & J8) showed positive result of chitinase activity and 2 best strains (J1 & J5) were selected for further study. Fungi J1 and J5 were identified as Aspergillus niger and Aspergillus fumigatus respectively. Greater quality of the enzyme production was achieved with the above strains and the molecular weight of the chitinase was determined by SDS-PAGE it was found to be around 23 KDa. Finally, degradation property of enzyme was assayed with chitin shell waste powder and observed that, degradation activity was higher in shrimp shell powder followed by Prawn shell. The fungal strains such as A. niger and A. fumigatus have been identified as good chitinase producers. Key words: Chitinase, Aspergillus, Artemia and Salt pan. 1. INTRODUCTION Microorganisms produce many secondary metabolites includes enzymes, pigments, antibiotics which could be of importance to mankind in many ways [1]. Microbial enzymes have several advantages over the enzymes resulting from plants or animals by high merit of their great variety of catalytic activities [2]. Bacteria and fungi are the source for several industrial enzymes includes DNase, lipase, alginase, proteases, chitinases and glutaminase [3, 4]. Chitinase is secondary metabolites produced by a number of naturally occurring microbes. In recent years, the demand for chitinase enzymes with new or attractive properties has augmented due to industrial application of chitin, chitosan and chitooligosaccharides [5]. Chitin is a β 1-4 linked homopolymer of N-acetylglucosamine, it is the second most abundant biodegradable polymer, can be found as a part of fungi, plants, crustaceans, insects, arthropods, and algae components [6]. Approximately 75% of the total weight of shellfish, such as shrimp, crabs and krill are considered * Corresponding Author Thanigaimalai Murugan, Centre for Biological Science, Noorul Islam Centre for Higher Education, Kumaracoil- 629 180, Tamil Nadu, India Email: muruganbt@gmail.com as waste, and chitin comprises 20 to 58% of the dry weight of the said waste [7]. Chitinase play important role in the treatment of chitin waste. The chitin wastes especially derived from sea-food- processing units cause remarkable environmental problems worldwide and the production chitinolytic enzyme is an important element to the utilization of shellfish wastes [8]. Several microorganisms, including bacteria such as Serratia marcescens, Bacillus lichiniformis, Bacillus subtilis, Bacillus thuringiensis, and Vibrio alginolyticus [9-11] and many species of fungi such as Asergillus sp., Myrothecium anisopliae, Streptomyces sp., Trichoderma harzianum, Trichoderma viride, and Verticillium lecanii [12-17] have chitinase producing ability. The aim of the present study is isolation and identification of native chitinolytic fungal strains. 2. MATERIALS AND METHODS 2.1. Collection of sample An infected Artemia (A.parthenogenetica) was collected from saltpan of Puthalam, Kanyakumari District, Tamil Nadu, India. The sample was collected in sterile glass container and immediately brought to the laboratory for further work.