Hydrolytic ferment

Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary
- Hydrolytic ferment (Physiol. Chem) an enzyme (formerly referred to as a ferment), which acts only in the presence of water, and which causes the substance acted upon to take up a molecule of water, resulting in the splitting of a chemical bond and often splitting one compound into two. Thus, diastase of malt, ptyalin of saliva, and boiling dilute sulphuric acid all convert starch by hydration into dextrin and sugar. Nearly all of the digestive enzymes are hydrolytic in their action. Since 1910 such an enzyme is usually referred to as a hydrolase or hydrolytic enzyme .
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The free acidity increases very rapidly, and is, doubtless, due to the decomposition of the neutral oil by the action of hydrolytic ferment.

"The Handbook of Soap Manufacture" by W. H. Simmons

The toxic agent is destroyed or rendered inactive in alkaline solution by a typical hydrolytic ferment, pancreatin.

"Handbook of Medical Entomology" by William Albert Riley

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