bio

Carbonic anhydrase

The enzyme that speeds the reaction between carbon dioxide and water, and it is extraordinarily fast: close to a million turnovers a second, among the quickest enzymes known. Without it, hydrating carbon dioxide would be thousands of times slower than the rate at which blood crosses a capillary, and the body could not convert its waste gas into transportable bicarbonate in time. It sits densely inside red cells and on the endothelial surfaces of the lung - anywhere a body needs to switch between gas and ion within the transit time of a single blood cell.