Detection of Chitinase on Chitin Agar Plates

Chitin polymer is the second most abundant polysaccharide on earth after cellulose. The linear insoluble structure of chitin is difficult to be degraded in nature. Hydrolysis of chitin by chemicals results in the production of various non-specific products and has been proved unsafe for the environment. Chitinase is the enzyme which hydrolyses chitin polymer into its oligosaccharides and then to its monomeric form i. e. into N-Acetyl glucosamine. Chitinase have received attention due to its applications in the medicine, agriculture, waste management and industries. When chitinase producing bacteria are isolated from various sources, there is a need to detect their chitinase activity by some convenient and efficient methods so that large number of isolates can be screened. In the present study, chitinase production by different bacterial isolates was detected by flooding the inoculated chitin agar plates with four different stains.