Lipase chemoselectivity towards alcohol and thiol acyl acceptors in a transacylation reaction

The lipase chemoselectivity towards an alcohol and a thiol was investigated for the two lipases Candida antarctica lipase B (CalB) and Rhizomucor miehei lipase (Rml). Hexanol and hexanethiol were used as acyl acceptors in a transacylation reaction with ethyl octanoate in cyclohexane. CalB showed the highest chemoselectivity ratio (k(cat)/K-M)(OH)/(k(cat)/K-M)(SH), of 88,000 while the ratio for Rml was 1200. That could be compared with the ratio, k(OH)/k(SH), of 120 for the non-catalyzed reaction. Thus, the enzyme contribution to the chemoselectivity between hexanol and hexanethiol was 730 for CalB and 10 for Rml. High K-M values displayed towards hexanethiol (above 1.8 M) were the largest contribution to the selectivity. No saturation was achieved. The K-M values were more than two orders of magnitude higher than those of hexanol. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.