One of the treatments for breast cancer is the administration of selective aroma
ID: 998403 • Letter: O
Question
One of the treatments for breast cancer is the administration of selective aromatase inhibitors. Aromatase is an enzyme involved in the synthesis of various estrogens, such gsJj&og; and estradiol. Aromatase inhibitors can be divided into two categories, type I and type II. Type I inhibitors are irreversible inhibitors of aromatase. Type II inhibitors are competitive inhibitors of aromatase. Given what you know about enzyme inhibition, explain the differences between irreversible and competitive enzyme inhibition.Explanation / Answer
An enzyme inhibitor is a molecule that binds to an enzyme and decreases its activity.
The binding of an inhibitor can stop a substrate from entering the enzyme's active site and/or hinder the enzyme from catalyzing its reaction. There are two types of binding nature of inhibitor i.e reversible or irreversible.
Irreversible inhibitors usually react with the enzyme and change it chemically by forming covalent bond. These inhibitors modify key amino acid residues needed for enzymatic activity.
Whereas Competitive inhibition is a form of enzyme inhibition where binding of the inhibitor to the active site on the enzyme prevents binding of the substrate and vice versa. In this case of inhibition, at any given moment, the enzyme may be bound to the inhibitor, the substrate, or neither, but it cannot bind both at the same time.
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