Yes, nitrogen will kill any living thing, but I wonder what effect it has on regular, sub-cellular enzymatic activity? If the enzyme needs oxygen to function or be regenerated it would stop working but there might be some "decomposer" enzymes that could keep going. Let me ask our resident biochemist about that.
I think a bigger problem would be from the lack of water vapor/humidity causing meats and fresh plant matter to dry out. Not a problem with grains and seeds as you can already buy nitrogen-packed packets of seeds for emergency gardens, but juicy stuff would probably suffer.
-Blast
AFAIK, I've never heard of nitrogen being used in enzymes. Certain things use nitrogen as parts of molecules (such as nitric oxide), but never strait N.
Enzymes don't typically need something to function. Generally, once the protein (enzyme) is made, it kind of just goes on it's own power. Some things will need a substrate to work, so another molecule or protein needs to bind the enzyme. There are also enzymes that use ATP (which needs O2 to be generated), electrical gradients (which need ATP to maintain the gradient), or enzymes that catalyze reactions that cause a cascade effect into the cell, with the end product being the final product.
So, really, I don't think nitrogen "kills" a cell like you're thinking. Rather, it's the lack of oxygen that causes the production of ATP to stop, and without that the cell can't keep making the proteins and enzymes it needs to function. IIRC, apoptosis (cell death) occurs when pre-packaged enzymes escape into the cell (example, hydrogen peroxide). But, I don't recall if that's O2 dependent, or if the O2 "holds back" that reaction.
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