program such as bestfit to determine sequence identity similarity or homology between two different amino acid sequences the default settings may be used or an appropriate scoring matrix such as blosum45 or blosum80 may be selected to optimize identity similarity or homology scores further racemases that may be used according to the invention are those portions or fragments of the above mentioned polypeptides exhibiting any enzymatic racemization of optically enriched n acetylamino acids methods for determining racemase activity of polypeptides have been described previously the analysis can thus be carried out for example by reacting enantiomer pure amino acid derivatives in the presence of a solution containing at least one polypeptide and following the formation of a corresponding racemate using a polarimeter perkin elmer 241 at various wavelengths the reaction can be carried out at temperatures ranging from 15 to 55 u00b0 c heatable cell for time increments from 3 to 12 hours in reaction media deemed appropriate for optimizing racemase activity for example the reaction media can be buffered at a ph ranging from 5 0 to 9 0 and can include divalent metal ion salt concentrations ranging from 1 to 15 mm u201c amino acid acylases u201d within the scope of the invention is understood to denote enzymes that deacetylate n acylamino acids in a stereospecific manner in principle all representatives of this class of compound known to the person skilled in the art are suitable for the reactions according to the invention and may.