| Abstract | Alkaline phosphatase (AP) is a general phosphatase that dephosphorylates a variety of compounds. There are several isoforms of ALP found in the human body, such as Intestinal AP, Placental AP, Germ cell AP, Tissue nonspecific alkaline phosphatase, or liver/bone/kidney (L/B/K) AP. Since it’s found in all tissues in the human body, it’s usually monitored in serum when investigating a dysfunction in the tissues harboring their specific isozyme. Abnormal AP activity is a health concern since it is associated with a variety of diseases, and specifically, high Placental AP (PAP) has been associated with preterm labor and early childbirth, which can have many complications. A healthy diet contains all the essential amino acids with the normal protein intake, and research has shown that all amino acids can act as inhibitors for alkaline phosphatase. For that, we wanted to test how good of an inhibitor L-phenylalanine, one of the essential amino acids, can be for placental alkaline phosphatase, as a healthy diet could keep alkaline phosphatase activity moderate and prevent premature childbirth. We measured the enzyme activity of placental alkaline phosphatase at different concentrations of enzyme and constant substrate, NPP, concentration to make select a concentration/activity where the enzyme concentration won’t affect the rate of the reaction, and then we assayed placental alkaline phosphatase for its activity with different NPP concentrations with and without the inhibitor, L-phenylalanine, to assess the inhibition. The results show that a relatively low concentration of L-phenylalanine (10 mM) is sufficient to inhibit phosphatase activity. Our results suggest that a good healthy diet containing sufficient protein intake may help in maintaining placental alkaline phosphatase activity and prevent premature childbirth by high PAP activity.
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