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Pyrimidine homeostasis is accomplished by directed overflow metabolism.

ABSTRACT: Cellular metabolism converts available nutrients into usable energy and biomass precursors. The process is regulated to facilitate efficient nutrient use and metabolic homeostasis. Feedback inhibition of the first committed step of a pathway by its final product is a classical means of controlling biosynthesis. In a canonical example, the first committed enzyme in the pyrimidine pathway in Escherichia coli is allosterically inhibited by cytidine triphosphate. The physiological consequences of disrupting this regulation, however, have not been previously explored. Here we identify an alternative regulatory strategy that enables precise control of pyrimidine pathway end-product levels, even in the presence of dysregulated biosynthetic flux. The mechanism involves cooperative feedback regulation of the near-terminal pathway enzyme uridine monophosphate kinase. Such feedback leads to build-up of the pathway intermediate uridine monophosphate, which is in turn degraded by a conserved phosphatase, here termed UmpH, with previously unknown physiological function. Such directed overflow metabolism allows homeostasis of uridine triphosphate and cytidine triphosphate levels at the expense of uracil excretion and slower growth during energy limitation. Disruption of the directed overflow regulatory mechanism impairs growth in pyrimidine-rich environments. Thus, pyrimidine homeostasis involves dual regulatory strategies, with classical feedback inhibition enhancing metabolic efficiency and directed overflow metabolism ensuring end-product homeostasis.

SUBMITTER: Reaves ML

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4470420 | biostudies-literature | 2013 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Pyrimidine homeostasis is accomplished by directed overflow metabolism.

Reaves Marshall Louis ML Young Brian D BD Hosios Aaron M AM Xu Yi-Fan YF Rabinowitz Joshua D JD

Nature 20130731 7461

Cellular metabolism converts available nutrients into usable energy and biomass precursors. The process is regulated to facilitate efficient nutrient use and metabolic homeostasis. Feedback inhibition of the first committed step of a pathway by its final product is a classical means of controlling biosynthesis. In a canonical example, the first committed enzyme in the pyrimidine pathway in Escherichia coli is allosterically inhibited by cytidine triphosphate. The physiological consequences of di ...[more]

PMID: 23903661

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Project description:When the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae is subjected to increasing glycolytic fluxes under aerobic conditions, there is a threshold value of the glucose uptake rate at which the metabolism shifts from being purely respiratory to mixed respiratory and fermentative. This shift is characterized by ethanol production, a phenomenon known as the Crabtree effect due to its analogy with lactate overflow in cancer cells. It is well known that at high glycolytic fluxes there is glucose repression of respiratory pathways resulting in a decrease in the respiratory capacity. Despite many years of detailed studies on this subject, it is not known whether the onset of the Crabtree effect (or overflow metabolism) is due to a limited respiratory capacity or caused by glucose-mediated repression of respiration. We addressed this issue by increasing respiration in S. cerevisiae by introducing a heterologous alternative oxidase, and observed reduced aerobic ethanol formation. In contrast, increasing non-respiratory NADH oxidation by overexpression of a water-forming NADH oxidase reduced aerobic glycerol formation. The metabolic response to elevated alternative oxidase occurred predominantly in the mitochondria, while NADH oxidase affected genes that catalyze cytosolic reactions. Moreover, NADH oxidase restored the deficiency of cytosolic NADH dehydrogenases in S. cerevisiae. These results indicate that NADH oxidase localizes in the cytosol, while alternative oxidase is directed to the mitochondria. The onset of aerobic ethanol formation is demonstrated to be a consequence of an imbalance in mitochondrial redox balancing. In addition to answering fundamental physiological questions, our findings are relevant for all biomass derived applications of S. cerevisiae. Experiment Overall Design: Heterologous gene expression in chemostats using Affymetrix Yeast Genome 2.0 arrays. Total RNA extraction and sample preparation, hybridization was done according to the manufacturer's protocol.

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Pyrimidine homeostasis is accomplished by directed overflow metabolism.

Publications

Pyrimidine homeostasis is accomplished by directed overflow metabolism.

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