Zoology Department

  Enzyme           Enzymes are biocatalysts that are proteinaceous (and even nucleic acids) and change the rate of a reaction. Thousands of chemical reactions take place at any given time in all of an organism's live cells. Enzymes, which are wonderful molecular machines, mediate nearly all of these processes. Enzymes are the catalysts of biological systems because they are at the heart of every metabolic reaction (biocatalysts). They catalyze hundreds of sequential reactions that degrade food molecules, store and transform chemical energy, and produce biological macromolecules from simple substrates in structured sequences. Metabolic pathways are closely coordinated through the action of regulatory enzymes, resulting in a harmonious balance among the many distinct activities required to sustain life. Enzymes catalyze an unlimited diversity of biochemical reactions because of their capacity to specifically bind a awfully wide selectio...