Octadecyl and sulfonyl modification of diatomite synergistically improved the immobilization efficiency of lipase and its application in the synthesis of pine sterol esters

Abstract Phytosterols usually have to be esterified to various phytosterol esters to avoid their disadvantages of unsatisfactory solubility and low bioavailability. The enzymatic synthesis of phytosterol esters in a solvent‐free system has advantages in terms of environmental friendliness, sustainability, and selectivity. However, the limitation of the low stability and recyclability of the lipase in the solvent‐free system, which often requires a relatively high temperature to induce the viscosity, also increased the industrial production cost. In this context, a low‐cost material, namely diatomite, was employed as the support in the immobilization of Candida rugosa lipase (CRL) due to its multiple modification sites. The Fe 3 O 4 was also then introduced to this system for quick and simple separation via the magnetic field. Moreover, to further enhance the immobilization efficiency of diatomite, a modification strategy which involved the octadecyl and sulfonyl group for regulating the hydrophobicity and interaction between the support and lipase was successfully developed. The optimization of the ratio of the modifiers suggested that the ‐SO 3 H/C 18 (1:1.5) performed best with an enzyme loading and enzyme activity of 84.8 mg·g −1 and 54 U·g −1 , respectively. Compared with free CRL, the thermal and storage stability of CRL@OSMD was significantly improved, which lays the foundation for the catalytic synthesis of phytosterol esters in solvent‐free systems. Fortunately, a yield of 95.0% was achieved after optimizing the reaction conditions, and a yield of 70.0% can still be maintained after six cycles.