Enzymes inhibitors Enzymes are a biological catalyst that accelerates a chemical reaction without itself being affected by the reaction. Enzymes are helpful because they speed up reactions. According to George Shields, “Protein enzymes work by bringing the reactants in a chemical reaction together in the most favorable geometrical arrangement, so that bonds can be easily broken and reformed. This is possible because different enzymes have different three-dimensional shapes.”
Another function of an enzyme is to maintain order of living things. According to Robert and Frieden, without enzymes, many reactions, such as “reactions to extract energy from substrate or synthesize cell components—would be too slow to permit orderly function of living …show more content…
“Streptokinase is an enzyme mixture that is useful in clearing blood clots that occur in the heart and the lower extremities. Another useful enzyme for dissolving blood clots that occur as a result of heart attacks is human tissue plasminogen activator (TPA). Recombinant TPA is produced by genetic engineering techniques, using bacteria cultures to produce large quantities of human TPA 3” (Shields).
In the first lab assignment about penicillin—How Penicillin Was Discovered, the lesson talked about how mold must be producing a chemical that killed bacteria. Turns out that an enzyme inhibitor used as a drug is penicillin.
The way that an enzyme inhibitor acts as a penicillin, is that it will cross-link different “strands of the wall and is catalyzed by the enzyme glycopeptide trans-peptidase. The shape of penicillin resembles that of the normal substrate of glycopeptide trans-peptidase, so that penicillin binds to the active site of the trans-peptidase enzyme. Once bound to the active site, penicillin forms a permanent bond with one of the amino acid residues. This chemical reaction permanently inhibits the glycopeptide trans-peptidase enzyme, thus preventing the trans-peptidase from cross-linking the bacterial wall 3”