STRONG CONTROL ON THE TRANSIT-TIME IN METABOLIC CHANNELING

A suite of different characteristic times is used to describe the temp oral behavior of a metabolic pathway, Here we focus on the 'transit' t ime, that is the average time it takes for a molecule, entering the st eady-state pathway as a substrate, to exit the pathway as a product, W e show that metabolic channelling results in dramatic changes in contr ol exerted by pathway enzymes on the transit time, In an 'ideal' pathw ay a doubling of the enzyme concentrations halves the transit time, In a dynamic channel such an increase can reduce the transit time by a f actor of four or more.