Glucose and gluconate dissimilation in Acetobacter suboxydans.

Investigations into the nature of the metabolism of glucose in Acetobacter suboxydans have revealed that both the pentose cycle (1) and a direct nonphosphorylative oxidation (2) contribute to the consumption of this substrate. Fructose, in like manner, dissimilates by way of the pentose pathway (3) as does glycerol, after its conversion to fructose-l ,6-diphosphate via triose phosphate (1,4). Some of the reactions of glycolysis have been documented (5), although the presence of the entire scheme is doubtful. Furthermore, despite the fact that A. suboxydans is an obligate aerobe, there is no evidence, as defined by standard manometric, chemical, and radioactive tracer experiments, for Krebs cycle activity in the organism (5-8). In this paper, an evaluation has been made of the contributions of known metabolic pathways to total glucose metabolism, with the use of the radiorespirometric method of Wang et al. (9). The evidence to be presented indicates that the pentose cycle accounts for the bulk of the metabolic “traffic.”