Enzyme inhibitor

An enzyme inhibitor is a molecule that binds to an enzyme and blocks its activity. Enzymes are proteins that speed up chemical reactions necessary for life, in which substrate molecules are converted into products.^[1] An enzyme facilitates a specific chemical reaction by binding the substrate to its active site, a specialized area on the enzyme that accelerates the most difficult step of the reaction.

An enzyme inhibitor stops ("inhibits") this process, either by binding to the enzyme's active site (thus preventing the substrate itself from binding) or by binding to another site on the enzyme such that the enzyme's catalysis of the reaction is blocked. Enzyme inhibitors may bind reversibly or irreversibly. Irreversible inhibitors form a chemical bond with the enzyme such that the enzyme is inhibited until the chemical bond is broken. By contrast, reversible inhibitors bind non-covalently and may spontaneously leave the enzyme, allowing the enzyme to resume its function. Reversible inhibitors produce different types of inhibition depending on whether they bind to the enzyme, the enzyme-substrate complex, or both.

Enzyme inhibitors play an important role in all cells, since they are generally specific to one enzyme each and serve to control that enzyme's activity. For example, enzymes in a metabolic pathway may be inhibited by molecules produced later in the pathway, thus curtailing the production of molecules that are no longer needed. This type of negative feedback is an important way to maintain balance in a cell.^[2] Enzyme inhibitors also control essential enzymes such as proteases or nucleases that, if left unchecked, may damage a cell. Many poisons produced by animals or plants are enzyme inhibitors that block the activity of crucial enzymes in prey or predators.

Many drug molecules are enzyme inhibitors that inhibit an aberrant human enzyme or an enzyme critical for the survival of a pathogen such as a virus, bacterium or parasite. Examples include methotrexate (used in chemotherapy and in treating rheumatic arthritis) and the protease inhibitors used to treat HIV/AIDS. Since anti-pathogen inhibitors generally target only one enzyme, such drugs are highly specific and generally produce few side effects in humans, provided that no analogous enzyme is found in humans. (This is often the case, since such pathogens and humans are genetically distant.) Medicinal enzyme inhibitors often have low dissociation constants, meaning that only a minute amount of the inhibitor is required to inhibit the enzyme. A low concentration of the enzyme inhibitor reduces the risk for liver and kidney damage and other adverse drug reactions in humans. Hence the discovery and refinement of enzyme inhibitors is an active area of research in biochemistry and pharmacology.