Life as we know it heavily relies on biological catalysis, in fact, in a very nonromantic version of it, life could be considered as a series of chemical reactions, regulated by the guarding principles of thermodynamics. In ancient times, a beating heart was a good sign of vitality, however, to me, it is actually the presence of active enzymes that counts… Though we do not usually pay attention...

Since the discovery of enzymes as biological catalysts, study of their enormous catalytic power and exquisite specificity has been central to biochemistry. Nevertheless, there is no universally accepted comprehensive description. Rather, numerous proposals have been presented over the past half century. The difficulty in developing a comprehensive description for the catalytic power of enzymes ...

Enzymes are biological catalysts (also known as biocatalysts) that speed up biochemical reactions in living organisms, and which can be extracted from cells and then used to catalyse a wide range of commercially important processes. This chapter covers the basic principles of enzymology, such as classification, structure, kinetics and inhibition, and also provides an overview of industrial appl...

This review highlights the biosynthesis of heterocycles in polyketide natural products with a focus on oxygen and nitrogen-containing heterocycles with ring sizes between 3 and 6 atoms. Heterocycles are abundant structural elements of natural products from all classes and they often contribute significantly to their biological activity. Progress in recent years has led to a much better understa...

This is a compilation of reference materials suggested for scientists considering a laboratory reference collection in clinical chemistry, or for librarians seeking to develop or add to an up-t-o-date library collection. Nine areas are represented: general clinical chemistry; analytical methods, procedures, and techniques; calculations and statistics; the clinical laboratory; drugs and metaboli...

Molecular Enzymology Group Colloquium Organized by D. Fell (School of Biological and Molecular Sciences, Oxford Brooke University) and D. Kell (Department of Biological Sciences, University College, Wales, Aberystwyth), Edited by D. Fell and Sponsored by Xenova Ltd, Zeneca Bioproducts, Glaxo Research and Development Ltd and SmithKline Beecham Pharmaceuticals. 653rd Meeting held at the Universit...

PhiRSB1 is a wide-host-range, T7-like bacteriophage that infects and efficiently lyses the phytopathogenic bacterium Ralstonia solanacearum. The phiRSB1 genome comprises 43,079 bp of double-stranded DNA (61.7% G+C) with 325-bp terminal repeats and contains 47 open reading frames. Strong activity of tandem early promoters and wide specificity of phage promoters of phiRSB1 were demonstrated.

Previously, bacteriophage vB_EcoM_AYO145A, which lyses Shiga toxin-producing Escherichia coli O145:NM, was classified as an O1-like virus of the Myoviridae family. Here, we report the complete genome sequence of this phage and a comparative genomic analysis with other known O1-like phages.