Molecular man is a modern day swinger. When doing the

horizontal polka with cocaine, some of the time, he likes to be by himself

as a monomer, some of the time he likes to have a party with two of his

identical friends and all metabolize cocaine together, as a trimer.

And sometimes, they get really crazy and form a hexamer,

that’s six molecular men waiting for some catalyzing action.

 

Courtesy Of" "Structural Basis of Heroin and Cocaine Metabolism by a Promiscuous Human Drug-Processing Enzyme.”

Molecular men in hexamer formation

 

When cocaine is the molecule being metabolized,molecular man has the best time

and the most efficient time metabolizing cocaine when in a trimer. When cocaine

is present molecular man is in trimer formation 75% of the time.

(see Backgrounds on allostery) Cocaine is not metabolized when

molecular man is with five of his buddies. It is thought that when in a

hexamer molecular men are very stable when traveling in the blood stream.

When the 6 partners in crime see some hot mamas (cocaine)

shaking their ester’s, they break off in to two trimers, and go to work.

For heroin, 50 percent of the time a hexamer is formed,

40 percent a trimer, and 10 percent a monomer.

 

Courtesy Of" "Structural Basis of Heroin and Cocaine Metabolism by a Promiscuous Human Drug-Processing Enzyme.”

An image from an atomic force microscope, showing surface topography,

which showsdistributionof monomers (red squares) trimers

(blue squares) and hexamers (white squares).

 

 

Please Click On The Links Below To Review The Individual Results

Trimer Hexamer Equilibrium ---- Metabolism Of Cocaine And Heroin