Properties of Enzymes
Following are the two most important properties of enzymes: (i) remarkable specificity provided due to enzyme's active site for substrate binding and subsequent chemical transformation, and (ii) often a phenomenal acceleration in the rate of reaction, which can reach a level of 10¹⁰ to 10²3 times the non-enzymatic rates. In absolute terms, the catalytic events due to an enzyme molecule can be as slow as one event per minute to 10⁵ events per second. A typical enzyme, having a molecular mass of 50,000 (M_r 50K) is comprised of 450 amino acid residues, of which ~ 400 residues involve 19 chiral-L-amino acids and the remaining ~50 residues consist of glycine (a non-chiral or symmetric amino acid; chiral means asymmetric). Out of 450 amino acids of an enzyme, it is the 400 chiral amino acid residues, which provide an asymmetric micro-environment for the formation of an active site for substrate binding and subsequent chemical transformation.