Amino acid oxaloacetate from

Acetyl-CoA from fatty acid oxidation enters the TCA cycle in the same way as does acetyl-CoA derived from glucose addition to oxaloacetate to make citrate. This can cause complications if an individual is metabolizing only fat, because the efficient metabolism of fat requires a supply of TCA-cycle intermediates, especially dicar-boxylic acids, which can t (usually) be made from fatty acids. These intermediates must be supplied by the metabolism of carbohydrates, or more often, amino acids derived from muscle tissue. 

In addition to the obvious role in the catabolism of macromolecules, the TCA cycle provides numerous intermediates for anabolic reactions, such as the synthesis of porphyrins from succinyl-CoA, purines from a-ketoglutarate, pyrimidines from fumarate and oxaloacetate, and proteins from amino acids derived from oxaloacetate, fumarate, and a-ketoglutarate. 

The nonessential amino acids are synthesized by quite simple reactions, whereas the pathways for the formation of the essential amino acids are quite complex. For example, the nonessential amino acids alanine and aspartate are synthesized in a single step from pyruvate and oxaloacetate, respectively. In contrast, the pathways for the essential amino acids require from 5 to 16 steps (Figure 24.8). The sole exception to this pattern is arginine, inasmuch as the synthesis of this nonessential amino acid de novo requires 10 steps. Typically, though, it is made in only 3 steps from ornithine as part of the urea cycle. Tyrosine, classified as a nonessential amino acid because it can be synthesized in 1 step from phenylalanine, requires 10 steps to be synthesized from scratch and is essential if phenylalanine is not abundant. We begin with the biosynthesis of nonessential amino acids. 

The amino acids differ from other classes of biomolecules in that each member of this class is synthesized by a unique pathway. Despite the tremendous diversity of amino acid synthetic pathways, they have one common feature. The carbon skeleton of each amino acid is derived from commonly available metabolic intermediates. Thus in animals, all NAA molecules are derivatives of either glyc-erate-3-phosphate, pyruvate, a-ketoglutarate, or oxaloacetate. Tyrosine, synthesized from the essential amino acid phenylalanine, is an exception to this rule. 

Another example of a coupled enzyme reaction demonstrates the versatility of the transaminase system in biocatalysis. Using a racemic d,L-amino acid mixture as the starting material, the enzyme D-amino acid oxidase from Trigonopsis mriabilis will convert the D-amino acid in the mixture selectively into the corresponding 2-keto acid. The L-amino acid of the d,l- pair is neither a substrate nor an inhibitor of d-amino acid oxidase. If a transaminase is present in the same reaction mixture, the 2-keto acid can be transaminated in the presence of L-aspartate to the corresponding L-amino acid. The entire reaction can be driven to completion as described previously by decarboxylation of the oxaloacetate. Thus, in a single pot, racemic d,l-amino acids can be convened directly into optically active L-amino acids (Fig. 12.7-11). 

As you may already suspect from the fact that amino acids can be converted into citric acid cycle intermediates, these same citric acid cycle intermediates can also be used as starting materials for the synthesis of amino acids. Oxaloacetate... 

The acetyl-CoA derived from amino acid degradation is normally insufficient for fatty acid biosynthesis, and the acetyl-CoA produced by pyruvate dehydrogenase and by fatty acid oxidation cannot cross the mitochondrial membrane to participate directly in fatty acid synthesis. Instead, acetyl-CoA is linked with oxaloacetate to form citrate, which is transported from the mitochondrial matrix to the cytosol (Figure 25.1). Here it can be converted back into acetyl-CoA and oxaloacetate by ATP-citrate lyase. In this manner, mitochondrial acetyl-CoA becomes the substrate for cytosolic fatty acid synthesis. (Oxaloacetate returns to the mitochondria in the form of either pyruvate or malate, which is then reconverted to acetyl-CoA and oxaloacetate, respectively.)... 

A possible explanation for the superiority of the amino donor, L-aspartic add, has come from studies carried out on mutants of E. coli, in which only one of the three transaminases that are found in E. coli are present. It is believed that a branched chain transaminase, an aromatic amino add transaminase and an aspartate phenylalanine aspartase can be present in E. coli. The reaction of each of these mutants with different amino donors gave results which indicated that branched chain transminase and aromatic amino add transminase containing mutants were not able to proceed to high levels of conversion of phenylpyruvic add to L-phenylalanine. However, aspartate phenylalanine transaminase containing mutants were able to yield 98% conversion on 100 mmol l 1 phenylpyruvic acid. The explanation for this is probably that both branched chain transaminase and aromatic amino acid transminase are feedback inhibited by L-phenylalanine, whereas aspartate phenylalanine transaminase is not inhibited by L-phenylalanine. In addition, since oxaloacetate, which is produced when aspartic add is used as the amino donor, is readily converted to pyruvic add, no feedback inhibition involving oxaloacetate occurs. The reason for low conversion yield of some E. coli strains might be that these E. cdi strains are defident in the aspartate phenylalanine transaminase. 

The citrate cycle is the final common pathway for the oxidation of acetyl-CoA derived from the metabolism of pyruvate, fatty acids, ketone bodies, and amino acids (Krebs, 1943 Greville, 1968). This is sometimes known as the Krebs or tricarboxylic acid cycle. Acetyl-CoA combines with oxaloacetate to form citrate which then undergoes a series of reactions involving the loss of two molecules of CO2 and four dehydrogenation steps. These reactions complete the cycle by regenerating oxaloacetate which can react with another molecule of acetyl-CoA (Figure 4). 

Aminotransferase (transaminase) reactions form pymvate from alanine, oxaloacetate from aspartate, and a-ketoglutarate from glutamate. Because these reactions are reversible, the cycle also serves as a source of carbon skeletons for the synthesis of these amino acids. Other amino acids contribute to gluconeogenesis because their carbon skeletons give rise to citric acid cycle... 

All vertebrates can form certain amino acids from amphibolic intermediates or from other dietary amino acids. The intermediates and the amino acids to which they give rise are a-ketoglutarate (Gin, Gin, Pro, Hyp), oxaloacetate (Asp, Asn) and 3-phospho-glycerate (Ser, Gly). 

The reactions that convert pyruvate to intermediates of the TCA cycle are called the anaplerotic reactions. Pyruvate, which can be made only from glucose or some of the amino acids, can be converted to oxaloacetate by the enzyme pyruvate carboxylase or to malate by malic enzyme. 

The alanine cycle accomplishes the same thing as the Cori cycle, except with an add-on feature (Fig. 17-11). Under conditions under which muscle is degrading protein (fasting, starvation, exhaustion), muscle must get rid of excess carbon waste (lactate and pyruvate) but also nitrogen waste from the metabolism of amino acids. Muscle (and other tissues) removes amino groups from amino acids by transamination with a 2-keto acid such as pyruvate (oxaloacetate is the other common 2-keto acid). 

The association between vitamin B6 deficiency and transamination emerged from 1945 when Schlenk and Fisher noted that pyridoxine-deficient rats had a diminished capacity for transamination. In the same year Gunsalus and his colleagues found transamination in Streptococcus faecalis depended on pydridoxal phosphate. The properties of the heat-stable component in purified glutamic-oxaloacetate transaminase were similar to those of pydridoxal phosphate. Later pyri-doxal phosphate was established as an essential coenzyme in many amino acid transformations. 

As we have seen, normally pyruvate would be the substrate for pyruvate dehydrogenase complex to form acetyl-CoA, but during fasting in the absence of glucose, acetyl -CoA for the TCA cycle is derived from fatty acid (3-oxidation (see Section 7.5.2) so pyruvate is diverted into oxaloacetate by the enzyme pyruvate carboxylase. Thus any amino acids whose carbon skeletons can be converted into pyruvate, OAA or another substrate of the TCA cycle, can be used for glucose synthesis. 

The aspartate and glutamate produced by these reactions, plus those taken up from the lumen, are metabolised to oxaloacetate and oxoglutarate, respectively, as discussed above. The a-NH2 group in these amino acids is transferred to pyruvate to form alanine, which is released and then taken up by the liver, where the NH2 group is converted to ammonia and then to urea. 

The degradation of most amino acids is anaplerotic, because it produces either intermediates of the cycle or pyruvate glucogenic amino acids see p. 180). Gluconeogenesis is in fact largely sustained by the degradation of amino acids. A particularly important anaplerotic step in animal metabolism leads from pyruvate to oxaloacetic acid. This ATP-dependent reaction is catalyzed by pyruvate... 

Non-essential amino acids are those that arise by transamination from 2-oxoacids in the intermediary metabolism. These belong to the glutamate family (Glu, Gin, Pro, Arg, derived from 2-oxoglutarate), the aspartate family (only Asp and Asn in this group, derived from oxaloacetate), and alanine, which can be formed by transamination from pyruvate. The amino acids in the serine family (Ser, Gly, Cys) and histidine, which arise from intermediates of glycolysis, can also be synthesized by the human body. 

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