Metabolic Control

Abstract

Understanding metabolic control is an important facet of manipulating metabolic pathways. It has been well documented that simple removal of competing pathways and regulatory effects results in limited success. More often than not, such modifications result in no change or an effect that is less beneficial than predicted. Control analysis provides a quantitative analysis of the system allowing us to better understand how systems respond to various perturbations. Consequently, knowledge of the systems response to perturbation allows us to target specific elements for modification so that the desired response is obtained. This article will focus on the various approaches developed for metabolic control as well as experimental approaches developed to obtain data for computational analysis. With full understanding of the dynamics of metabolic control, a successful manipulation of the metabolic flux and metabolite concentrations can be achieved.