Ferredoxin in reductive biosynthesis

Reduced Ferredoxin in Reductive Biosynthesis Constructing the Monomer Units... 

The function of ferredoxin in anaerobic bacteria, photosynthetic bacteria, and green plants is described in the remainder of this chapter. Some of the characteristics of these organisms are illustrated in Fig. 9. Anaerobic bacteria, such as C. pasteurianum, obtain their energy chemically by fermenting carbon compounds. In fermentation, the oxidation of a substrate is coupled to the production of ATP and a reductant, which are both necessary for the synthesis of new cell material. The carbon required for biosynthesis comes from fermentation intermediates and CO2. 

Apart from hydrogen evolution, the electrons of reduced ferredoxin can take alternative routes leading to biosynthesis. In anaerobic bacteria, reduced ferredoxin can be used directly for the reduction of pyridine nucleotides (Tagawa and Arnon (99) Valentine, Brill and Wolfe (107) Fredericks and Stadtman (44)) for the reduction of hydroxyla-mine to ammonia (Valentine, Mortenson, Mower, Jackson, and Wolfe (109) for COa fixation in the reductive carboxylation of acetyl-CoA to pyruvate (Bachofen, Buchanan, and Arnon (13) Raeburn and Rabino-witz (83) Andrews and Morris (3) Stern (98)) for the reduction of sulfite to sulfide (Akagi (1)) and, in the presence of ATP, it can be used for the reduction of N2 to NH3 (Mortenson (72,73) D Eustachio and Hardy (40)). The role of ferredoxin in these reactions as well as in the oxidative degradative reactions discussed above is summarized in Fig. 10. 

The resolution of two high spin forms in adrenal mitochondria has been exploited in studies of the stimulation of steroid biosynthesis by ACTH and the effects of stress. Mitochondria from stressed rats showed increased amounts of high spin P-450, most notably in that corresponding to cholesterol side chain cleavage and similar but not identical effects were observed when hypophysectomised rats were treated with ACTH [118]. This supports the thesis that ACTH stimulation increases the availability of cholesterol for side chain cleavage. In adrenals, ESR can also be used to monitor the presence of reducing equivalents to P-450 as, in this case, the P-450 is linked to NADPH via an iron-sulphur protein, adrenal ferredoxin. This shows typical signals on reduction at g = 2.01, 1.94 [119]. A similar iron-sulphur protein (g = 2.03, 1.94) occurs in mammalian testes connected with a P-450 system [120]. 

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