POTENTIAL OF CELLULASE OF PENICILLIUM VERMICULATUM FOR PREPARATION AND CHARACTERIZATION OF MICROCRYSTALLINE CELLULOSE PRODUCED FROM α-CELLULOSE OF KAPOK PERICARPIUM (CEIBA PENTANDRA) Original Article HERMAN SURYADI, SUTRIYO, MI’RAJUNNISA, YULIANITA PRATIWI INDAH LESTARI Faculty of Pharmacy, Universitas Indonesia, Depok, 16424, Indonesia Email: hsuryadi@farmasi.ui.ac.id Received: 04 Apr 2019, Revised and Accepted: 17 Apr 2019 ABSTRACT Objective: This study aimed to find psychochemical properties of microcrystalline cellulose (MCC) obtained from α-cellulose kapok pericarpium. Methods: The cellulase activity was screened by clear zone and sugar reduction method. The enzyme from selected mold was purified by diethylaminoethyl (DEAE) chromatography. α-cellulose of kapok pericarpium was hydrolyzed using the purified cellulase enzymes. Microcrystalline cellulose (MCC) was identified by Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectrometry, and qualitative analysis test. The MCC samples were characterized for pH test, x-ray diffraction (XRD), and particle size analyzer (PSA). Results: The optimum cellulase activity was shown by Penicillium vermiculatum. It’s clear zone diameter around 3 cm and the cellulase activity was 67.73±0.25 mU/ml. The strongest cellulase activity was detected from 1st fraction (P1) out of 6 column fractions with optimum activity at 1.177±2 mU/ml. The optimal conditions for microcrystalline cellulose (MCC) preparation were at 50 ˚C, for 2 h, using 20 ml of acetate buffer pH 5 and 2 ml of cellulase enzyme. Microcrystalline cellulose (MCC) obtained at 78% w/w and its FTIR spectrum and x-ray diffractogram similar to reference while the pH of MCC was fulfilled requirements of The United States Pharmacopoeia 2007. Conclusion: The use of purified enzyme of cellulase has succeded in microcrystalline cellulose (MCC) preparation and MCC yield obtained was 78% w/w, which showed similar characteristics to reference (Avicel PH 101) Keywords: Microcrystalline cellulose, Enzyme purification, Kapok, Enzyme Hydrolyisis, Characterization © 2019 The Authors. Published by Innovare Academic Sciences Pvt Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.22159/ijap.2019v11i4.31094 INTRODUCTION The kapok tree, Ceiba pentandra, formerly Bombacaceae family, is cultivated widely in southeast asia, as well as other parts of east Asia and Africa. The kapok fiber is an agricultural product obtained from the fruits of the kapok tree. Chemical compositions of kapok fiber are chemically composed of 64% cellulose, 13% lignin, and 23% pentosan [1]. Cellulose is the linear polymer of anhydroglucose and one of the most abundantly occurring natural polymers on earth. Cellulose is one of the complex carbohydrates consisting of 3000 or more glucose units. Cellulose derivatives are a class of natural polymers in which cellulose is swollen to form films with higher tensile strength and improved water vapor properties [2]. High cellulosic content of kapok fiber indicated its potential as source for microcrystalline cellulose (MCC), which is micro-sized crystalline part extracted from cellulose [3]. Microcrystalline cellulose (MCC) is an additional material that is used in the wide range of pharmaceutical, food, cosmetics, and other industries. Microcrystalline cellulose (MCC) is one of the most important tableting excipients due to its outstanding dry binding properties, enabling the manufacture of tablets by direct compression (DC) [4, 5] and it is most common excipient utilized for the production of pellets via extrusion spheronisation technique. In case of a drug having low solubility, MCC can give prolonged drug release profile due to the lack of disintegration of MCC based pellets [6]. The source of pharmaceutical excipient that can be obtained commercially is wood, but also it still used for various other purposes, such as making furniture, paper, tissue, and others. The use of wood in preparation microcrystalline cellulose is considered to be less effective because it reduces the number of trees on a large scale resulting in ecological imbalances. According to Rasha and Myasar (2018), drug formula that was prepared with MCC showed the shortest disintegration, flow properties ranged from good to fair [7]. Microcrystalline cellulose (MCC) can be synthesized through two different processes, namely the process of acid hydrolysis and enzymatic hydrolysis. The advantage of enzymatic hydrolysis is the methods of working at low temperature and low cost. In our previous study, the cellulolytic isolates from the soil have a high glucose concentration . In this study, α-cellulose from kapok pericarpium was hydrolyzed using purified enzymes. Cellulase enzymes used was selected from a few molds which had the optimum cellulolytic activity from several molds. The fraction of the cellulase enzyme with the highest cellulase activity was used for hydrolysis. Microcrystalline cellulose (MCC) obtained were identified using Fourier transform infrared (FTIR), and qualitative analysis. The samples were characterized for pH test, x-ray diffraction (XRD), and particle size analyzer (PSA). and it’s needed 10% v/v crude enzyme extract for preparation of cellulose microcrystalline from water hyacinth, so it needs the more enzyme volume of crude extract enzym for preparation of microcrystalline cellulose [8]. To overcome high glucose concentration, purified enzymes are expected to reduce b-glucosidase activity which can degrade cellulose to glucose. MATERIALS AND METHODS Raw material The raw material used in this study was kapok pericarpium powder obtained by Wahid’s kapok farm, Pati district, Central Java province. The raw material was dried and homogenized at Balitro, Bogor city, West Java province. Chemical material The chemicals used in this study were Avicel PH 101 as a reference, nitric acid (Merck), acetic acid (Merck), sodium hydroxide (Merck), sodium hypochlorite (Merck), sodium nitrite (Merck), sodium sulfite (Merck), KBr powder (Merck), potato dextrose agar (DifcoTM), yeast extract (Himedia), peptone (DifcoTM), glucose (Merck), zinc chloride (Merck), aquadestillata (Merck), aquabidestillata (Otsuka). International Journal of Applied Pharmaceutics ISSN- 0975-7058 Vol 11, Issue 4, 2019