Fixação de nitrogênio: estrutura, função e modelagem bioinorgânica das nitrogenases

Biological nitrogen fixation, catalyzed by nitrogenases, contributes about half of the nitrogen needed to global agriculture. For forty years synthetic chemists and theoreticians have tried to understand and model the structure and function of this important metalloenzyme. Ten years after the first...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Nunes Fábio Souza, Raimondi Angela Cristina, Niedwieski Antonio Carlos
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Sociedade Brasileira de Química 2003-01-01
Series:Química Nova
Subjects:
Online Access:http://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0100-40422003000600016
Description
Summary:Biological nitrogen fixation, catalyzed by nitrogenases, contributes about half of the nitrogen needed to global agriculture. For forty years synthetic chemists and theoreticians have tried to understand and model the structure and function of this important metalloenzyme. Ten years after the first report on the crystal structure of the MoFe protein, scientists still have not been able to synthesize a chemical equivalent of the FeMo cofactor nor the structure knowledge revealed the key to its catalytic activity. This paper with 104 references presents a review of the most relevant advances in chemical nitrogen fixation and their relation with the nitrogenases.
ISSN:0100-4042
1678-7064