Marketed as Xenical, this prescription drug is a lipase inhibitor that prevents the absorption of about one-third of ingested fats.
Other types of drugs, called lipase inhibitors, act on the digestive system to block the absorption of fat.
Lipase breaks down stored fat in the body.
That such enzymes are formed in the protoplasm is evident from the behaviour of hyphae, which have been observed to pierce cell-membranes, the chitinous coats of insects, artificial collodion films and layers of wax, &c. That a fungus can secrete more than one enzyme, according to the materials its hyphae have to attack, has been shown by the extraction of diastase, inulase, trehalase, invertase, maltase, raffinase, malizitase, emulsin, trypsin and lipase from Aspergillus by Bourquelot, and similar events occur in other fungi.
