CHAOS IN GLYCOLYSIS

Glycolysis occurs in almost every living cell as part of the energy me tabolism. It forms a complex dynamical system, and might thus be capab le of exhibiting complex phenomena. Simple oscillations have been obse rved frequently in suspensions of intact cells and in cell extracts, b ut only as transients. We have obtained sustained simple and complex o scillations in glycolysis of cell-free yeast extract in a flow-reactor . Sustained oscillations enable a powerful, proven method of dynamical system theory to unravel the kinetics and make it possible to observe chaos. Chaos was predicted from models long ago but has not previousl y been observed experimentally. We report the first experimental obser vation of unforced chaotic oscillations in glycolysis. (C) 1997 Academ ic Press Limited.