NAV

Metabolic Reaction


A metabolic reaction is a molecular process in which a drug or chemical interacts with an enzyme, transforming the drug or chemical into one or more specific metabolites. The particular reaction type of such a process depends on the enzyme involved and the molecular activities it performs on the drug or chemical. A drug or chemical may undergo few or many consecutive metabolic reactions before the resultant metabolites are no longer metabolized any further.  In this context, each consecutive metabolic reaction is an individual sequence within a family of related reactions associated with a certain drug or chemical.

Each metabolic reaction in DrugBank is associated with a unique reaction number identifier. For example, reaction 2180 identifies the metabolic reaction in which (R)-Fluoxetine undergoes N-dealkylation to (R)-Norfluoxetine.