A deep learning multi-attention Bi-GRU framework for k_cat prediction with segmentation-based insights

Enzymes play a crucial role in metabolism. The rate at which enzyme sequence data is emerging far exceeds the rate at which we can measure the associated catalytic constants, posing a significant problem for the advancement of the fields of metabolic engineering and synthetic biology. Here, we present KcatNeuroCortex, an interpretable and novel deep learning framework for enzyme catalytic efficiency prediction. The proposed architecture combines Bi-directional Gated Recurrent Units (Bi-GRU) with a multi-attention mechanism designed to mirror how enzymes work. It first captures local functional motifs through a segmentation-based strategy, and then integrates these into a global representation of long-range interactions that shape the catalytic landscape, leading to improved interpretability and prediction accuracy. KcatNeuroCortex achieves good results, with R² values of 0.74 and RMSE values of 0.77, representing a 57% improvement compared to DLKcat. We demonstrate that our segmentation-aware, attention-enhanced approach achieves competitive performance compared to conventional sequence-based models, especially on diverse and low-similarity sequences. The framework is robust, scalable, and interpretable, making it a valuable tool for enzyme engineering and large-scale kinetic parameter estimation. Also, the work establishes that deep learning can move beyond prediction to provide a biologically meaningful understanding of enzyme catalysis, positioning KcatNeuroCortex as a very valuable tool for the enzyme engineering community.