A novel strategy to improve the aromatic alcohols tolerance of enzyme for preparative-scale synthesis of natural glycosides

Aromatic alcohols are liable to result in enzyme inactivation. A novel strategy was established for improving the aromatic alcohol tolerance of β-galactosidase (BMG) from Bacillus megaterium YZ08. The half-life of BMG in 200 mM vanillyl alcohol solution was dramatically increased by 9–123 times with the addition of hydrophilic solvents. In 30% DMSO, the reaction concentration of aromatic alcohol could reach up to 300–400 mM, and 0.85–2.44 g of natural glycosides were successfully obtained in 100 mL-scale. The simple and effective strategy shows potential applications when dealing with the preparative-scale exploitation of enzymatic reactions.