Marine invertebrates have highly active digestive enzymes. Beside their ability to cleave various food items, these enzymes can exhibit extraordinary catalytical properties with respect to specificity, turnover performance, and thermal stability. Highly specific bio-active substances are important for technological applications in pharmacy, food processing and aquaculture.The project is aimed to investigate with biochemical state of the art methods the catalytic properties of digestive enzymes in marine invertebrates from a wide geographical and ecological range. Target species will be preferably crustaceans and molluscs.Comparative investigations in concert with feeding experiments will elucidate the dynamics of induction and catalytic potential. The regulation efficiency of inhibitors will be clarified and the characteristics of selected digestive enzymes will be determined with respect to potential biotechnological applications.