Question

List and explain at least three different factors that could determine the activity of enzymes in metabolic pathway?

Answer 1

There are several factors that might affect the activity of enzymes in the metabolic pathway. They are:

• Enzyme Concentration
• Substrate
• Inhibitors: Inhibitors are substances that alter the catalytic action of the enzyme. As a consequence of which slow down, or in some cases, stop catalysis happens. There are three common types of enzyme inhibition - competitive, non-competitive and substrate inhibition.
• Temperature: Like most of the chemical reactions, the rate of an enzyme-catalyzed reaction increases as the temperature is raised continually
• pH: The most favorable pH value of an enzyme is the point where the enzyme is most active - is known as the optimum pH. Moreover, extremely high or low pH values may result in complete loss of activity for most of the enzymes.