Essay On Salivary Amylase

Domenique Moore

Lydia Vicente

Deneil Ferguson

Suleyma Arriaza

Kimberly Gordon

Date

Introduction Enzymes are made of proteins with specific three dimensional shapes that are necessary for proper functioning. They function as catalysts, which means that they increase or decrease the rate at which chemicals react and processes occur in living organisms. Therefore they allow certain chemical reactions to occur at a faster rate then the reactions would normally occur on their own. All catalysts are enzymes, however not all enzymes are catalysts. A catalyst is a substance that accelerates a chemical reaction but does not become part of the end product. Enzymes are important because the rate at which reactions occur depends on them. Thus without enzymes, reactions would occur too slowly to keep a person alive. The basic function of an enzyme is to increase the rate of a reaction, and most enzymes act specifically with only one reactant, called a substrate, to produce products. Amylase is an enzyme present in saliva that causes starch to break down into smaller sugars, such as maltose, by hydrolysis. Amylase digests starch by catalyzing hydrolysis, which

At 0°C, enzymatic reaction of salivary amylase occurs slowly or not at all due to lack of energy and heat. As the temperature increases, its enzymatic also increases up until the optimum temperature. Figure 1 shows that the optimum temperature of salivary amylase is about 37°C.This applies to the human body since salivary amylase is suitable to function within these temperatures. After 37°C, the graph then steeply declines as a result of loss of activity. At 70°C and 100°C, salivary amylase is denatured. The molecular conformation of the enzyme becomes altered as the hydrogen bonds responsible for its secondary, tertiary and quaternary structures are