i have a question, chemical inductries which supply trypsin to laboratories recommend that the enzyme be stored at temperatures below -20 degrees and at ph 3. Explain why these precautions are neccessary?
please and thank you
Been a while since I did VCE chem, but I think a bit of uni med knowledge can answer this one
Firstly, it helps to know a bit about trypsin! Not sure how much your question stem has given you, but basically trypsin is an enzyme (prote
ase) in the digestive system that catalyzes the hydrolysis of peptide bonds. It is released from the pancreas as it's
inactive form: trypsinogen. This means that trypsin is an
active biological molecule. Now, thinking back to the information we have: it's in the body, it's an active enzyme, it breaks down bonds in proteins. Hence, reasonable to assume that the optimal temperature would be around that of our body (~37 deg C) and the pH that of where it's found (for simplicity, let's say around 7).
Now the question: "temperatures below -20 degrees and at ph 3". So what this is telling us, is that we're storing in an environment that is very
different to the optimal environment of the enzyme. This means that the enzyme activity will be very slow (cold temperatures are very unlikely to denature the enzyme, just make it's activity very very slow). Why this is important relates to it's function: breaking down peptide bonds. Now, trypsin, being a protein with peptide bonds of its own, could in fact "digest itself" (autolysis of the stores), which would be counterproductive considering the aim is to store the enzyme.
Hence, in short a sample response could be:
"The reason for storing trypsin at -20 deg C and at a pH of 3 is to take the enzyme away from it's optimal environment that is found in the human digestive tract. This is important because the function of trypsin is to break down peptide bonds and given that the aim is to maintain a store of this molecule, it is essential that there is no breaking down of the enzyme itself. Hence, moving the enzyme to an environment that is both far from optimal yet also one that will not denature it is ideal for storage."
Hope that helps
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