A novel promising laccase from the psychrotolerant and halotolerant Antarctic marine Halomonas sp. M68 strain

During the Italian National Antarctic Research Program ANT-biofilm (PNRA16_00105) project, marine microbial biofilms and seawater samples were collected from the Terra Nova Bay littoral (Ross Sea, Victoria Land), where the Italian research station Mario Zucchelli is located (Figure 1). From these samples, a total of 186 morphologically diverse microorganisms (146 from biofilm and 40 from seawater) were isolated, by combining different isolation methods and using more than a dozen of cultivation media incubated at different temperatures (4, 20 and 28 °C). This yielded an Antarctic marine microbial strain collection, which could represent a promising source for novel extremozymes identification. The 186 Antarctic marine strains were therefore screened through a variety of in solid colorimetric a/o degradation enzymatic assays on agar plates for the detection of different hydrolytic or oxidative enzymatic activities of interest.