AP Bio Question addressed to Experts!

Test Preparation AP Sciences
1

<p>I have encountered a problem while solving some questions in Barron's.</p>

<p>There is this table the book shows in which the experimenter has recorded the amount of products formed by a certain amount of enzymes (unchanging) throughout consecutive time intervals. This amount of products starts to be stagnant and remains the same for two time intervals that terminate the table.</p>

<p>The book seems to argue that this unfluctuating product amount means that the enzymes are saturated.. I thought so too, at first. Now that I think of it, I wonder why the enzymes will all of a sudden stop catalyzing products even in small amounts.. </p>

<p>Although they are saturated, wouldn't the enzymes spew out at least an inkling of products? To me, the fact that there is no increase in product formation translates into another, more plausible scenario that the enzymes have catalyzed all of the reactants into products and there's no more left to catalyze.</p>

<p>So how can Barron's be so sure of its explanation..? </p>

<p>Is it really true that when enzymes are saturated, the product formation rate is zero?
Is no product formed?? Please help,</p>

<p>Thanx in advance :) I'm sure you'll be contributing to my AP score</p>

2

<p>Are you sure the table is total amount of product and not amount of product per time period? Because what you said is correct. At saturation point, the enzymes will have the maximum rate of product formation.</p>

3

<p>yeah
if the table showed the amount of product per time period, that’d be showing the rate of production for every so much interval… </p>

<p>What I’m saying is that even when the enzymes are saturated, there’d still be x mount of products formed (however meager that may be, since all the enzymes are busy)</p>

<p>:)</p>

4

<p>Well, if I’m understanding you correctly, the table is along the lines of:
Time/product produced per time
0-1 min/1 mol
1-2 min/2 mol
2-3 min/3 mol
3-4 min/3 mol</p>

<p>In this case, the reaction is still happening at 3 moles per minute at every time past 2 minutes. The reaction is still taking place at maximum velocity, but it is not speeding up.</p>

5

<p>The table does not have the category “product produce per time” which is the production rate in other words. Rather, the category is “the amount of product” itself, which merely intensifies my curiosity and misgivings about the question… …</p>

6

<p>Can you take a picture of it and post it here?</p>

7

<p>I’m afraid I don’t know how to… :stuck_out_tongue: Do you, by any chance, have a Barron’s AP Bio book? It is the only enzyme question with a table attached to it in the questions section right after the first chapter (or the second).</p>