ABSTRACT The division of enzymes and their activities into the two separate groups of intermediary metabolism and drug/xenobiotic metabolism is artificial as several recognized overlaps occur in both directions. This article summarises the known incursions of drug molecules into the arena of intermediary metabolism and highlights another classical enzyme, phenylalanine 4-monooxygenase, that has now been demonstrated to undertake the metabolism of two widely employed mucoregulatory drugs. The design and construction of drug molecules to engage with targets identified via information gathered from the human genome project will eventually lead to therapeutic agents closely resembling endogenous molecules. Their interaction with enzymes of intermediary metabolism, acting as alternative substrates, will not only influence their pharmacokinetic profiles, which may be inherently variable, but may also lead to a mass of associations some of which may be deleterious to the host.
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