Improve catalyst wording in enzymatic reactions section#476
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Water is consumed as a reactant when the seed's stored starch and proteins are hydrolysed, so it is an activator rather than a catalyst. The enzymes are the actual catalysts, which also aligns with the following paragraph. Thank you to Matthijs Velzen for the kind and careful feedback that prompted this fix.
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What
Reword the description of seed germination in section 2.1 (enzymatic reactions) so that water is described as the activator of the reactions rather than the catalyst, and the enzymes are correctly identified as the catalysts.
Before:
After:
Why
This came from kind, careful reader feedback. When the seed's stored starch and proteins are broken down (hydrolysis), water is consumed as a reactant — it is not regenerated, so by definition it is not a catalyst. The enzymes are the true catalysts. The new wording is chemically accurate and also reads more naturally into the very next paragraph, which already refers to "the enzymes that trigger this process."
Credit
Thank you to Matthijs Velzen for spotting this and taking the time to write in with such thoughtful, generous feedback. 🙏