identifier: traitmech:000152
label: alpha-fucosidase activity
definition: A physiological enzyme-activity phenotype in which a cell produces active
  alpha-fucosidase enzymes that hydrolyze alpha-L-fucosides to L-fucose and an alcohol.
definition_source: https://iubmb.qmul.ac.uk/enzyme/EC3/2/1/51.html
trait_category: PHYSIOLOGY
term_kind: CLASS
mapping_status: PROPOSED
parent_traits:
- METPO:1000059
evidence:
- reference: https://iubmb.qmul.ac.uk/enzyme/EC3/2/1/51.html
  snippet: 'Reaction: an α-L-fucoside + H2O = L-fucose + an alcohol'
  notes: The NC-IUBMB EC 3.2.1.51 entry defines alpha-L-fucosidase by its accepted
    name and hydrolytic reaction, grounding the enzyme activity named by the organism-level
    phenotype.
- reference: DOI:10.1128/jcm.22.3.333-335.1985
  snippet: Positive reactions for alpha-glucosidase, beta-glucosidase, alpha-fucosidase,
    and alpha-glucuronidase suggest that "B. forsythus" may be saccharolytic.
  notes: Tanner et al. detected alpha-fucosidase in the then-proposed oral species
    Bacteroides forsythus with the API ZYM enzyme activity panel.
canonical_examples:
- taxon_id: NCBITaxon:28112
  taxon_label: Tannerella forsythia
  note: Tanner et al. reported alpha-fucosidase-positive reactions for "Bacteroides
    forsythus", the basonym of Tannerella forsythia, in API ZYM profiles.
  reference: DOI:10.1128/jcm.22.3.333-335.1985
discussions:
- discussion_id: alpha-fucosidase-activity-xref-gap
  prompt: Resolve an exact external ontology class for alpha-fucosidase activity before
    adding a TraitRecord xref.
  kind: CURATION_TODO
  status: OPEN
  rationale: GO:0004560 carries the alpha-L-fucosidase activity label but denotes
    the enzyme molecular function rather than the organism-level alpha-fucosidase
    production phenotype, so it is appropriate as a causal-node grounding rather than
    an equivalent TraitRecord xref.
  posed_by: codex
  posed_date: '2026-09-12'
curation_history:
- timestamp: '2026-09-12T01:09:57Z'
  curator: codex
  action: MINTED_TRAITMECH_ID
  changes: Minted alpha-fucosidase activity as a URL/DOI-backed TraitRecord after
    a repository-wide duplicate review covering ignored and hidden files; METPO has
    no exact alpha-fucosidase activity class yet.
  llm_assisted: true