BIOSYNTHESIS OF RIBOSE AND DEOXYRIBOSE IN PSEUDOMONAS SACCHAROPHILA

Abstract

Fossitt, Dexter D. (University of Michigan, Ann Arbor), and I. A. Bernstein . Biosynthesis of ribose and deoxyribose in Pseudomonas saccharophila . J. Bacteriol. 86: 1326–1331. 1963.—The biosynthesis of ribose and deoxyribose in Pseudomonas saccharophila was studied by radioisotope-tracer techniques. Patterns of C 14 in ribose isolated from the nucleic acids of cells grown on labeled glucose suggested that pentose was made by the pathway involving transaldolase and transketolase. When cells were grown on radioactive gluconate, the tracer patterns indicated the possibility of a new pathway for the biosynthesis of ribose. Isotopic patterns in deoxyribose, in general, were consistent with the pathway involving reduction of ribonucleotides to deoxyribonucleotides. Certain aspects of the data, however, were not explained by this known pathway.