Abstract
FOR some time we have been engaged in a study of the starch-synthesizing enzymes of Polytomella cœca, a flagellate which produces starch from sodium acetate and ethyl alcohol, but not from sugars1. This starch is similar to most natural starches inasmuch as it consists of amylose and amylopectin components, the latter being the major constituent2. It has already been reported by Lwoff, Ionesco and Gutmann1,3 that Polytomella cœca contains a phosphorylase which utilizes glucose-1-phosphate as the substrate for the synthesis of an iodophilic polysaccharide; this claim has been verified hi these laboratories4. However, since phosphorylases are known to catalyse the formation of only 1:4-α-glycosidic linkages, it seemed probable that, for the synthesis of the branch points of amylopectin, the organism must employ a second enzyme, similar to the Q-enzyme of the potato5 or the ‘branching factor’ of liver and heart6.
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References
Lwoff, A., Ionesco, H., and Gutmann, A., Biochim. et Biophys. Acta, 4, 270 (1950).
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Lwoff, A., Ionesco, H., and Gutmann, A., C.R. Acad. Sci., Paris, 228, 342 (1949).
Bebbington, A., Bourne, E. J., Stacey, M., and Wilkinson, I. A. (forthcoming publication).
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Cori, C. F., and Cori, G. T., J. Biol. Chem., 151, 57 (1943).
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Cori, C. F., and Cori, G. T., J. Biol. Chem., 131, 397 (1939).
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BARKER, S., BEBBINGTON, A. & BOURNE, E. Carbohydrate Primers for Q-Enzyme. Nature 168, 834–835 (1951). https://doi.org/10.1038/168834b0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/168834b0
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