Enzyme Inhibitors

Question 1

Medications involving enzyme inhibitors - ANTIBIOTICS

Answer 1

• kills bacteria inside our bodies
• work by inhibiting bacterial enzymes
• such an enzymes needed by bacteria to make new cell walls when they replicate.
• Bacteria cannot survive without a cell wall.
• when they take up water by osmosis, they burst & die.

Question 2

Medications involving enzyme inhibitors - ANTIVIRALS

Answer 2

• Used to slow down the reproduction of viruses inside our bodies.
• Some of them work by inhibiting viral enzymes.

Question 3

Inhibitors can sometimes be metabolic poisons - CYANIDE

Answer 3

• A non-competitive irreversible inhibitor which can attach to one of the enzymes involved in cellular respiration in mammals.
• If enzyme is inhibited, respiration cannot occur and the organism dies

Question 4

Inhibitors can sometimes be metabolic poisons - ARSENIC

Answer 4

• A non-competitive irreversible inhibitor of another respiratory enzyme in mammals
• Enzyme inhibited, respiration cannot occur and organism will die.

Question 5

END PRODUCTION INHIBITION

Answer 5

• The product of a reaction can inhibit one of the enzymes involved in its own production.
• common in many metabolic pathways
• irreversible

Question 6

Why is End Product Inhibition useful?

Answer 6

• Most of the time a cell will only want a certain amount of molecules being produced.

Question 7

Using Enzyme Inhibition to protect cells

Answer 7

• Enymes made in inactive forms called PRECURSORS - in order to prevent damage to cells
• Pre-cursor enzymes usually need to undergo a change in shape of their active site to be ‘activated’.
• adding a co factor

Question 8

What is the pre-cursor called?

Answer 8

• apopoenzyme

Question 9

What is a holoenzyme/

Answer 9

• when the cofactor is added to the enzyme, activating it

Question 10

How does pre-cursor become activated?

Answer 10

• changing the conditions such as temperature/PH