Question

How can we increase the enzyme activity?

Answer 1

Enzyme activity:

1. Enzymes are biological catalysts that decrease the energy activation barrier, which the substrates are required to overcome to convert into products.
2. Enzymes don't participate in the reaction itself.
3. Enzyme activity is the projection of the number of active enzymes in the reaction mixture that help in the conversion of reactants to products.
4. Enzyme activity can also be described in terms of enzyme unit (U), which is the amount of enzyme that is involved in the catalysis of the conversion of one micromole of substrate per minute under specific conditions. (1U = μmol/min).
5. Coenzymes are the molecules that bind to enzymes to activate them, hence coenzymes can increase the activity of enzymes.
6. Enzyme activity can depend on the temperature, pH, and concentration.

Increment of enzyme activity:

1. Increasing the temperature of the enzymatic reaction, speeds the reaction as it increases the enzymatic activity increases, similarly the reverse happens and the enzyme activity and reaction speed decrease upon decreasing the reaction temperature.
2. As every enzyme has its optimum pH gradient at which it has its most functionality, hence enzyme activity can be increased by conducting the reaction at optimum pH.
3. Enzymes can easily get degraded at extreme pH ranges.
4. Similarly, increasing the enzyme concentration will also increase the enzyme activity and speed up the reaction.
5. Enzymatic reaction rate also depends on the concentration of substrates as they can act as the limiting factor, hence increasing substrate concentration increases the reaction speed and enzymatic activity.