Many drugs used as medicines work by this mechanism
Both substrate and inhibitor try to bind to the active site
Inhibitor binding may covalently alter a functional group on the enzyme
Substrate has similar shape as inhibitor
Inhibition can be reversed when subtrate is at very high levels
can poison the enzyme permanently
Inhibitor binding alters 3D shape of enzyme making it unsuitable for substrate binding
Inhibitor binds at allosteric site on the enzyme