David wrote:
>A postscript to the recent discussion on rate-determining steps. I've just
>been sent an inspection copy of 'Structure and Mechanism in Protein
>Science' by Alan Fersht, which at a quick glance looks like a useful book
>in the areas on which he is an expert.
Very good in some aspects; very disappointing in others. Unfortunately it's
only too plain which parts of the subject don't interest him much.
>>Unfortunately, in Chapter 10, section F, Regulation of metabolic pathways,
>p.308, he starts:
>"The rate of chemical flux through a metabolic pathway is often regulated
>by controlling the activity of a key enzyme in the pathway. The natural
>point of control is the enzyme whose catalytic activity is the
>rate-limiting step in the pathway."
>>This is then followed by some of the 1960s concepts of identifying
>rate-limiting enzymes. At the end of the paragraph he does say
>"The flux through metabolic pathways is now studied by control analysis.
>(refs 39-44)"
>However, he gives no indication of what this means, and with all respect to
>those of my friends appearing in the cited literature, it does not seem to
>have been selected to give an overview of the field of control analysis.
I had the same difficulty. In fact I found it very difficult to think of a
rationale for the selection; there doesn't seem to be any connecting link
between the six papers cited. Maybe it went something like this:
Reviewer: I think you need to say something about metabolic control analysis.
Author: What's that? Never heard of it.
Reviewer: I don't have much idea either, but someone left me a list of
references the other day.
Author: How many?
Reviewer: About a hundred.
Author: I'm certainly not going to wade through all those. I'll just cite
some of the ones from 1997 and everyone will be impressed at how up to date
I am.
>>Probably you won't be surprised to hear that the first example after this
>section is PFK.
>Not too surprised, no. But it's a bit like reading a newspaper account of
some event you know about independently, when you wonder if journalists are
just as slapdash when they write about things you don't know about.
Athel
Email: athel at ibsm.cnrs-mrs.fr
Site map: http://ir2lcb.cnrs-mrs.fr/~athel/sitemap.htm
Visegrad, April 1999: http://ir2lcb.cnrs-mrs.fr/~athel/meet99.htm
New Beer in an Old Bottle: http://ir2lcb.cnrs-mrs.fr/~athel/buchner.htm
MCA FAQ: http://ir2lcb.cnrs-mrs.fr/~athel/mcafaq.htm
MCA chapter from my book:
http://ir2lcb.cnrs-mrs.fr/~athel/mcai.htm
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