In a previous paper, the authors reported that phospholipase was not present originally in cows milk but produced by multipling bacteria.
This paper is concerned with the separation of phospholipase producing bacteria from precultivated milk and their cultivation in a medium of egg yolk agar or blood agar. The most active phospholipase producing bacterium, Enterobacter aerogenes, was separated, and the general properties and specificity of the enzyme of this bacterium were studied.
The results obtained are as follows: (1) Optimum temperature is 38-40°C. (2) Optimum pH is 7.0-7.3. (3) This enzyme has the phospholipase activity against phosphatidylethanolamine, phosphatidylserine and phosphatidylcholine, but not active against sphingomyelin. (4) This enzyme is presumed to be an induced enzyme because of the phospholipase activity in enzyme preparation which can be noted only when phospholipids are added into a medium. This activity can not be found in the enzyme preparation made from a phospholipids-free medium.