I recently saw a seminar in which someone spoke about the purine pathway
enzymes
within the mitochondria. They were proposing that the enzymes formed
big complexes
with one other and that substrates channel from one enzyme to the next
in the pathway
without being released into solution. A good deal of their evidence was
of the negative
variety: i.e. the rates of purine formation could not be described using
combinations of the
rates constants determined for the individual enzymes.
This was a pretty cool idea, and evidently not a new one. As it seems
to fall squarely
within the boundaries of this news group, I decided to hear what other
people on
this list thought about it.
Ronald Koder
The Institute for Biophysical Research on Macromolecular Assemblies
The Johns Hopkins University
