Bifidobacterium adolescentis possesses several arabinofuranosidases able to hydrolyze arabinoxylans (AX) and AX oligosaccharides (AXOS) the latter being bifidogenic carbohydrates with potential prebiotic properties We characterized two new recombinant arabinofuranosidases AbfA and AbfB and AXH-d3 a previously studied arabinofuranosidase from B adolescentis AbfA belongs to glycoside hydrolase family (GH) 43 and removed arabinose from the C(0)2 and C(0)3 position of monosubstituted xylose residues Furthermore hydrolytic activity of AbfA was much larger towards substrates with a low amount of arabinose substitutions AbfB from GH 51 only cleaved arabinoses on position C(O)3 of disubstituted xyloses similar to GH 43 AXH-d3 making it to our knowledge the first reported enzyme with this specificity in GH 51 AbfA acted synergistically with AbfB and AXH-d3 In combination with AXH-d3 it released 60% of arabinose from wheat AX Together with recent studies on other AXOS degrading enzymes from B adolescentis these findings allowed us to postulate a mechanism for the uptake and hydrolysis of bifidogenic AXOS by this organism (C) 2010 Elsevier Inc All rights reserved