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‘Designer Enzymes’: A Major Breakthrough in Chemistry
'Previous reports of designed enzymes have not been very successful, and some have been withdrawn. That is hardly surprising, considering the challenge of designing in days or weeks what nature has perfected over billions of years of evolution. The rate enhancements by our designer enzymes are modest and hardly competitive, so far, with those observed for their natural counterparts,' Houk said.
The implementation of the aldol reaction in the active site of an enzyme has been an important challenge. The reaction involves at least six chemical transformations, requiring UCLA scientists to compute all six chemical steps with their corresponding transition states. The structures were then combined in such a way to allow all six steps to occur.
Houk's team of 30 computational chemists used quantum mechanical calculations to discover chemical reactions with supercomputers.
Using algorithms and supercomputers, the UCLA chemists designed the active site for the enzymes, the area of the enzymes in which the chemical reactions take place, and give a blueprint for the active site to their University of Washington colleagues.
Baker and his group then used their computer programs to design a sequence of amino acids that fold to produce an active site like the one designed by Houk's group. Baker's group then produced the enzymes.
Enzymes are the ultimate 'green' catalysts by performing under ambient conditions in water, Houk said.
The study is published in the journal Nature.
Source-ANI
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