Pharmaceuticals and Fine Chemicals Quiz Answers

Industrial Biotechnology

University of Manchester

Go to this Course: Industrial Biotechnology

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Pharmaceuticals and Fine Chemicals

Question 1)

Enzymes are only used industrially to make chiral molecules

• Enzymes cannot make chiral products, they are only used to make products which do not possess chirality
• Yes, enzymes are only useful more the manufacture of chiral products such as valuable pharmaceutical intermediates
• Enzymes are often used to make chiral products, but can be successfully used in some cases for achiral products
• There are no examples of enzymes as catalysts in chemical processes in an industrial setting

Question 2)

Which of the following can a transaminase be employed to achieve?

• Hydroxylation of aromatic molecules
• Reduction of ketones to chiral alcohols
• Synthesis of sugars from carbohydrates
• The synthesis of chiral primary amines 

Question 3)

An IB manufacturing process is always a more sustainable option than a pure chemical process

• IB can never compete with chemical processes which boast higher productivity and better cost efficiency
• IB is not always, but in some circumstances, can be more sustainable than a chemical process for a given product
• IB processes are always more sustainable than any traditional chemical methods employed in industry
• IB processes are not scalable as manufacturing routes and so cannot be used for the production of bulk or commodity chemicals

Question 4)

In reducing the environmental impact of a process, what is one of the biggest benefits of moving to an IB process?

• Providing an alternative route
• Reducing/ removing the use of organic solvents and hazardous reagents 
• Reducing space the time yields (throughput) and cost efficiency of a process
• Reducing the amount of water used as most enzymes work in the absence of water

Question 5)

IB/biocatalysed processes can be used for ...

• Only for the manufacture of complex high value products like pharmaceuticals
• Only for the manufacture of biofuels which are more sustainably resourced than current fuels
• A wide range of functional molecules including
• pharmaceuticals, personal care products and bulk chemicals
• Only for foodstuffs such as dietary supplements, nutraceuticals and flavour compounds

Question 6)

When screening for a given transformation to design a new process, you need to start with a hit from a known enzyme on the given substrate of choice 

• Yes, this is correct
• If screening commercially available enzymes does not produce a hit on the substrate of choice, then it is not possible to develop an IB process
• No, in silico design, modelling understanding the  reactivity of related simple substrates and can help us design a bespoke enzyme
• An enzyme evolution study needs to start with really simple models

Question 7)

Enzymes that use complex and expensive co-factors like NADPH or PLP cannot be used in economically viable commercial processes.

• A number of different ways are known to recycle co-factors like NADH, and these can be scaled up to give viable large scale processes
• We can add stoichiometric co-factors as this is very cost efficient
• Enzymes that use co-factors are generally not used in IB processes as they do not perform synthetically useful reactions of interest to industry
• Yes, this is generally true as they cannot be sourced sustainably or regenerated during the reaction

Question 8)

When designing a manufacturing process, safe operation is a  top consideration

• All enzyme reactions are endothermic and this must be taken into account in the design of all IB processes
• Enzymes work at very low temperatures and so cooling systems are often required
• Most enzymes work at high pressures so safety needs to be a high priority
• Most IB processes occur in water at near neutral pH, near ambient temperature, and are not exothermic

Question 9)

Enzymes are only useful for the manipulation of functional groups like ketones and alcohols

• Enzymes are not useful catalysts for functional group manipulation and those that are, are not selective for similar groups at different positions
• Generally this is true as enzymes do not work on more complex or unactivated chemical groups
• Enzymes are useful catalysts for the manipulation of functional groups, but also for carbon-carbon and carbon-heteroatom bond synthesis
• Enzymes are not useful catalysts for functional group manipulation and are employed mostly in forming bonds between molecules

Question 10)

Enzymes are very useful catalysts but only for natural substrates

• No, but it takes many years to evolve an enzyme for a given substrate
• Enzyme mutants can now be quickly evolved to accept a wide range of unnatural substrates
• It is not possible to change the substrate for a given enzyme
• Yes, this is true

Question 11)

If you wanted to prepare an ester using an enzyme catalysed process, which enzyme would you use?

• An Aldolase
• An oxidoreductase like a ketoreductase
• An oxidoreductase like an amino acid oxidase
• A hydrolase like a lipase

Question 12)

What will a nitrile hydratase transform a nitrile group into?

• A mixture of products
• A primary amide only
• Carboxylic acid only
• A primary amine only