As educated as I think I am, it is always humbling to read a hacker news comment that I cannot understand.
ELI5?
So I'll break it down:
- "feruloyl esterase" : an 'esterase' is an enzyme that makes or breaks ester bonds. In this case, 'feruloyl' which I've never heard of but apparently is some small molecule that is normally attached to a sugar. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feruloyl_esterase
- "conserved alpha/beta-hydrolase fold" : a structural pattern (fold) that is shared (conserved) between a set of structures. In other words, these enzymes all have roughly the same shape. https://www.cathdb.info/version/v4_3_0/superfamily/3.40.50.1...
- "additional flexible 'lid' domain that covers the active site" : a 'domain' is just a compact part of a protein, without going into too much detail. They are calling it a 'flexible lid' as the idea is that it moves out of the way to bind the substrate to the active site (where the reaction is carried out) and back again when fully bound.
Lot of reactions are energetically favorable. But the reactants are stuck in a local minima. So either doesn't happen or is too slow. Enzymes mediate the reaction so it can happen or happen faster.
Lot of reactions there are side reactions that produce stuff you don't want. Resulting a terrible yield or maybe none. Enzymes can promote the reaction you want increasing the yield.
Interesting thing to watch for is eletrocatalysts. Where you use electricity and a catalist to push a reaction that is energetically unfavorable. Like CO2 + H2O --> methanol. These may become very important as we stop pumping oil and gas out of the ground.