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Updated: Jul 21, 2026

An Assay for Measuring the Activity of Escherichia coli Inducible Lysine Decarboxyase
Published on: December 20, 2010
A continual spectrophotometric assay for amino acid decarboxylases
F Scriven1, K B Wlasichuk, M M Palcic
1Department of Food Science, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada.
Abstract:
A spectrophotometric method for assaying the activity of three amino acid decarboxylases is reported. This method makes use of the coupled reaction of the decarboxylase with phosphoenolpyruvate carboxylase and malate dehydrogenase. The assay is simple and rapid and allows continuous monitoring of the reaction progress. The kinetic parameters obtained using this method for diaminopimelate decarboxylase, lysine decarboxylase, and arginine decarboxylase are comparable to values obtained by radiochemical methods.

