Recent progress on enzyme immobilisation, enzyme production, coenzyme regeneration and enzyme engineering has opened up fascinating new fields for the potential application of enzymes in a large range of different areas. As more progress in research and application of enzymes has been made the lack of an up-to-date overview of enzyme molecular properties has become more apparent. Therefore, we started the development of an enzyme data in formation system as part of protein-design activities at GBF. The present book" Enzyme Handbook" represents the printed version of this data bank. In future a computer searchable version will be also available. The enzymes in this Handbook are arranged according to the Enzyme Commission list of enzymes. Some 3000 "different" enzymes will be covered. Frequently enzymes with very different properties are included under the same EC number. Although we intend to give a representative overview on the characteristics and variability of each enzyme the Handbook is not a com pendium. The reader will have to go to the primary literature for more detailed information. Naturally it is not possible to cover all the numerous literature references for each enzyme (for special enzymes up to 40000) if the data re presentation is to be concise as is intended.

Recent progress on enzyme immobilisation, enzyme production, coenzyme regeneration and enzyme engineering has opened up fascinating new fields for the potential application of enzymes in a large range of different areas. As more progress in research and application of enzymes has been made the lack of an up-to-date overview of enzyme molecular properties has become more apparent. Therefore, we started the development of an enzyme data in formation system as part of protein-design activities at GBF. The present book" Enzyme Handbook" represents the printed version of this data bank. In future a computer searchable version will be also available. The enzymes in this Handbook are arranged according to the Enzyme Commission list of enzymes. Some 3000 "different" enzymes will be covered. Frequently enzymes with very different properties are included under the same EC number. Although we intend to give a representative overview on the characteristics and variability of each enzyme the Handbook is not a com pendium. The reader will have to go to the primary literature for more detailed information. Naturally it is not possible to cover all the numerous literature references for each enzyme (for special enzymes up to 40000) if the data re presentation is to be concise as is intended.

Recent progress in enzyme immobilisation, enzyme production, coenzyme regeneration and enzyme engineering has opened up fascinating new fields for the potential application of enzymes in a large range of different areas. As more progress in research and application of enzymes has been made the more apparent has become the lack of an up-to-date overview of enzyme molecular properties. The need for such a data bank was also expressed by the EC-task force "Biotechnology and Information". Therefore we started the development of an enzyme data information system as part of protein-design activities at GBF. The present book "Enzyme Handbook" represents the printed version of this data bank. In future it is also planned to make a com puter searchable version available. The enzymes in the Handbook are arranged according to the 1984 Enzyme Commission list of enzymes and later supplements. Some 3000 "different" en zymes are covered. Frequently very different enzymes are included under the same E. C. number. Although we intended to give a representative overview on the molecular variability of each enzyme, the Handbook is not a com pendium. The reader will have to go to the primary literature for more detailed information. Naturally it is not possible to cover all numerous, up to 40 000, literature references for each enzyme if data representation is to be concise as is intended.

I t is a pleasure to write a few lines to welcome this labour of Iove. I t is always dangeraus to draw sharp divisions between the interests of different scientists. However, in the present stage of progress in enzymology, there are those who are primarily interested in the molecular mechanisms of the reactions of a few selected enzymes, while others are involved in the grand scheme of the chemical metabolism of cells or whole organisms. Fortunately Dr. Barman has had experience in both the molecular and the metabolic aspects of enzymology. He therefore knows the require ments of research workers interested in enzymes from many different points of view. It would be foolish to hope that a handbook of this kind will provide all the information about enzymes which different specialists would wish to find. The author has attempted to help users in the following way. If one Iooks up a particular enzyme one will find all the basic data and a very good Iist of references for more specialized information. Apart from selection of the type of information provided, the author's judgement on the reliability of data is, of course, of critical importance in a handbook. If contradicting published information about some property of an enzyme has to be sorted out, it is often neither possible to teil the whole story nor to give an objective judgement.