Abstract
Thermal inactivation of immobilized glucose isomerase in a concentrated glucose solution was investigated in the batch mode and temperature range of 83–95 °C, which is substantially higher than the temperature used in the industrial production of high-fructose corn syrup. Simultaneous evaluation of all inactivation data showed that first-order kinetics with the Arrhenius temperature dependence of the rate constant provided a good approximation of the biocatalyst stability under the investigated conditions. The model parameters were then used to predict the operational temperature for this biocatalyst in the production of high-fructose corn syrup based on the set operational life-time of the biocatalyst. The simulation predicted a window of operational temperature of 60–65 °C, which corresponds very well with the industrial applications of this biocatalyst. This observation demonstrates that the multi-temperature method of enzyme inactivation can provide a good estimate of biocatalyst process stability and is thus a useful tool in the development of biocatalytic processes.