Mechanisms in Bioenergetics

Abstract

This book, the third volume in the "Advanced Biochemistry Series," is a highly successful presentation of a comprehensive yet searching account of the current state of our understanding of the biochemical mechanisms of ATP metabolism. "Current" means reaching into 1964, the year that followed the delivery of this material in a series of lectures at Cornell University. The book is marked by an intimacy that can come only from personal involvement of its author with the "creation" of its subject matter. At the same time, the book is focussed on a broad horizon, coupling involvement with detachment. Of such a feat only an author is capable whose interest in his subject has developed into mastery. The book retains the lecture format (18 lectures in three parts), including the welcome informality of direct speech: addressing you in the first person. This style lends itself well to the introduction of humor, to relieve absorption with a topic that is certainly no laughing matter. The lecture mottos are a source of special delight: they are, in this book, what they are frequently not in others-apt. The first two parts deal with the manner in which the central metabolic energy carrier, ATP, is made in cells of microorganisms and animals (the discussion of photophosphorylation has been reserved for another volume by another author of this series). Six lectures are devoted to the discussion of the more simple, soluble, enzymic systems that catalyze-in a great variety of special ways-the oxidative formation of energy-rich intermediates. In the next eight lectures there follows a detailed review of what is known of the uniform process whereby subcellular structures of supermolecular complexity are reduced and oxidized cyclically, trapping the chemical energy yielded by electron transport, at some point of the cycle, in the synthesis of ATP. The third part of the book, in four lectures, is centered on the regulation of the utilization of ATP in soluble systems and also in the highly organized structures of the cell. The author addresses his book to the advanced student of biochemistrystudent meant in the broad sense. A general familiarity with basic chemical concepts and a broad acquaintance with the facts of elementary biochemistry are assumed and the author wastes no time in getting down to a discussion of his topic in depth. His approach is very clearly that of the experimental scientist and this is the most appealing feature of this book. Arguments are built in terms of laboratory findings. Many of these are presented in detail, others are hinted at, but in all cases the references to the research literature are there for the reader whose thirst for detail remains unsated or whose grasp may weaken. Among the visual aids used in the book, tables and general reaction schemes abound, but graphs and structural formulae are scarce. At least to this reviewer, the latter is regrettable, although easily justified perhaps by editorial concern for brevity and simplicity of presentation. In any case, many involved passages, describing reaction schemes in words, might be expected to be fully ap-