How Enzymes Work:
Amino Acids, Proteins, and Biochemistry
Amino acids are organic compounds made of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, and (in some cases) sulfur bonded in characteristic formations. Strings of 50 or more amino acids are known as proteins, large molecules that serve the functions of promoting normal growth, repairing damaged tissue, contributing to the body's immune system, and making enzymes. The latter are a type of protein that functions as a catalyst, a substance that speeds up a chemical reaction without participating in it. Catalysts, of which enzymes in the bodies of plants and animals are a good example, thus are not consumed in the reaction.
Catalysts
In a chemical reaction, substances known as reactants interact with one another to create new substances, called products. Energy is an important component in the chemical reaction, because a certain threshold, termed the activation energy, must be crossed before a reaction can occur. To increase the rate at which a reaction takes place and to hasten the crossing of the activation energy threshold, it is necessary to do one of three things.
The first two options are to increase either the concentration of reactants or the temperature at which the reaction takes place. It is not always feasible or desirable, however, to do either of these things. Many of the processes that take place in the human body, for instance, normally would require high temperatures—temperatures, in fact, that are too high to sustain human life. Imagine what would happen if the only way we had of digesting starch was to heat it to the boiling point inside our stomachs! Fortunately, there is a third option: the introduction of a catalyst, a substance that speeds up a reaction without participating in it either as a reactant or as a product. Catalysts thus are not consumed in the reaction. Enzymes, which facilitate the necessary reactions in our bodies without raising temperatures or increasing the concentrations of substances, are a prime example of a chemical catalyst.
2006-12-11 02:31:36
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answer #1
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answered by Som™ 6
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Enzymes are proteins that act as catalysts. A catalyst is a chemical that takes part in a chemical reaction but remains unchanged. For instance pure hydrogen gas will not burn, but if there is a water molecule around, it can act as a catalyst and the hydrogen will burn, producing water vapor which also acts as a catalyst.
How the first water molecule got there is a chicken and egg kind of question.
Get up in the morning and see the sun,
High up in the air.
Hardly ain't a person that's tall enough,
To hang it way up there.
Gotta be a great Somebody,
Could'a hung the sun up there.
You didn't do it and I didn't do it.
Gotta be a Lord somewhere.
2006-12-11 02:43:31
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answer #2
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answered by The Bird 3
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now and lower back, it has have been given to do with the burden-help plan you're ingesting. a properly-balanced weight-help plan wealthy in supplements and fish perhaps might desire to advance your memory and make you extra alert on your daily events. And for some they practice to remember, via taking part in those memory video games. those are what card counters do i think of, they practice to count style taking part in cards as a manner to cheat the on line casino. maximum critically is to pay extra interest for the time of conversations and stuff. I actually have a chum who has undesirable memory too, a minimum of that's what i mean, the place in actually actuality he heavily isn't paying sufficient interest. He might inquire from me the superb comparable question some cases considered one of them is: dont you're able to desire to circulate to the army? and that i informed him no no no as i m not decrease than conscription. And the final time i've got been given extremely pissed and defined to him what the F*ck is misguided with him and made particular he remembered the respond. Oh and scaling down on undesirable stuff like alcohol and changing your daily recurring little via little might help too. case in point, take a clean course on your thank you to artwork, this might practice the brains to not be so consistent and predictable.
2016-12-11 06:51:40
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answer #3
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answered by ? 4
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short version enzymes alter their substrate while they stay the same-thats what I recall from doing my L.C 6 months ago...
2006-12-11 02:45:03
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answer #4
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answered by Dude 2
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