Summarizing lecture: factors influencing enzymatic H-transfers, analysis of nuclear tunnelling isotope effects and thermodynamic versus specific effects

Abstract

In the articles in this Discussion, a wide variety of topics are treated, including reorganization energy, initially introduced for electron transfers (‘environmentally assisted tunnelling’), nuclear tunnelling, H/D and kinetic isotope effects (KIEs), the effect of changes of distal and nearby amino acid residues using site-directed mutagenesis, and dynamics versus statistical effects. A coordinate-free form of semi-classical theory is used to examine topics on data such as tunnelling versus ‘over-the-barrier’ paths and temperature and pressure effects on KIEs. The multidimensional semi-classical theory includes classically allowed and classically forbidden transitions. More generally, we address the question of relating kinetic to thermodynamic factors, as in the electron transfer field, so learning about specific versus thermodynamic effects in enzyme catalysis and KIEs.