

11 



BIOCHEMISTRY 

 FROM THE STANDPOINT 



OF ENZYMES 



DAVID E. GREEN, chief of the enzyme research laboratory 



DEPARTMENT OF MEDICINE, COLLEGE OF PHYSICIANS AND SURGEONS, 

 COLUMBIA university; PAUL-LEWIS AWARD FOR ENZYME CHEMISTRY 



/: 



'T WOULD be in the nature of a platitude to say that there 

 is hardly a branch of biochemistry which cannot be analyzed 

 or at least interpreted in terms of enzymes or enzymic phenomena. 

 Yet few would maintain that enzymes represent more than an intel- 

 lectual liqueur in the teaching of biochemistry in our graduate schools. 

 Most modern textbooks of biochemistry often treat the subject of en- 

 zymes much in the manner that feathers and scales are dealt with in 

 textbooks of anatomy. If this were merely another instance of the lag 

 of textbooks behind developments in research, there would be no cause 

 for concern. But more appears to be involved than the traditional 

 lag. The implications of enzyme chemistry have yet to be more 

 generally understood; and until that time arrives the textbooks will 

 continue to regard enzymes as chemical oddities, if not to ignore them 

 altogether. 



During the past fifty years, biochemistry has developed from the 

 ugly duckling of physiology to a science in its own right. During this 

 period, interest has been focused largely on methodological and struc- 

 tural problems: how to estimate and what the constitution is of the 

 innumerable compounds which make up the living cell. In this phase 

 in the development of biochemistry, the analytical chemist and struc- 



