Effect of physicochemical parameters on the stability and activity of garlic alliinase and its use for in-situ allicin synthesis

Garlic is a well-known example of natural self-defence system consisting of an inactive substrate (alliin) and enzyme (alliinase) which, when combined, produce highly antimicrobial allicin. Increase of alliinase stability and its activity are of paramount importance in various applications relying on its use for in-situ synthesis of allicin or its analogues, e.g., pulmonary drug delivery, treatment of superficial injuries, or urease inhibitors in fertilizers. Here, we discuss the effect of temperature, pH, buffers, salts, and additives, i.e. antioxidants, chelating agents, reducing agents and cosolvents, on the stability and the activity of alliinase extracted from garlic. The effects of the storage temperature and relative humidity on the stability of lyophilized alliinase was demonstrated. A combination of the short half-life, high reactivity and non-specificity to particular proteins are reasons most bacteria cannot deal with allicin’s mode of action and develop effective defence mechanism, which could be the key to sustainable drug design addressing serious problems with escalating emergence of multidrug-resistant (MDR) bacterial strains.