BioND | Untangling energy metabolism

gross2011untangling

Untangling energy metabolism

Thilo Gross

Physics 4, 63 (2011)

According to new calculations, prolonged chemical oscillations that occur in the metabolic process of glycolysis can be linked to a single enzyme.

The glycolic pathway. Glycolysis (the metabolism of sugar) is catalyzed by a network of many enzymatic reactions. Gehrmann et al. use a theoretical approach to predict how each reaction impacts the energy supply. Their analysis allows them to identify phosphofructokinase, the relevant enzyme in step 3, as the enzyme responsible for sustained oscillations in glycolysis.

Figure 1: The glycolic pathway. Glycolysis (the metabolism of sugar) is catalyzed by a network of many enzymatic reactions. Gehrmann et al. use a theoretical approach to predict how each reaction impacts the energy supply. Their analysis allows them to identify phosphofructokinase, the relevant enzyme in step 3, as the enzyme responsible for sustained oscillations in glycolysis.