In biology the active site is part of an enzyme where substrates bind and undergo a chemical reaction. The majority of enzymes are proteins but RNA enzymes called ribozymes also exist. The active site of an enzyme is usually found in a cleft or pocket that is lined by amino acid residues (or nucleotides in ribozymes) that participate in recognition of the substrate. Residues that directly participate in the catalytic reaction mechanism are called active site residues.
Read more about Active Site: Binding Mechanism, Chemistry
Famous quotes containing the words active and/or site:
“Things happen to us, all the time. It was like that for a century, and it is again. It’s not like here: People always do things, because you are born with it; you are brought up in this spirit, the active approach to life: “Stand up and go.” We were not. We were always passive in our lives.”
—Natasha Dudinska (b. c. 1967)
“I am not aware that any man has ever built on the spot which I occupy. Deliver me from a city built on the site of a more ancient city, whose materials are ruins, whose gardens cemeteries. The soil is blanched and accursed there, and before that becomes necessary the earth itself will be destroyed.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)