The surprisingly resourceful ways bacteria thrive in the human gut

The gut microbiome is so useful to human digestion and health that it is often called an extra digestive organ. This vast collection of bacteria and other microorganisms in the intestine helps us break down foods and produce ...

Canine mother baseline metabolites measured

The Clinic for Animal Reproduction, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Freie Universitaet Berlin in Germany, has investigated the intensive molecular changes that take place during dog pregnancy.

Unlocking the biochemical treasure chest within microbes

Secondary metabolites—the compounds produced by microbes to mediate internal and external messaging, self-defense, and chemical warfare—are the basis for hundreds of invaluable agricultural, industrial, and medical products. ...

Researchers devise a new way to plot circadian clock

(Phys.org)—Everyone has an internal clock, that mysterious process which controls sleeping and hunger patterns, but now researchers are finding out that because the internal clock also controls metabolism, it would be helpful ...

Root microbes may be the secret to a better tasting cup of tea

You'd think the complex flavor in a quality cup of tea would depend mainly on the tea varieties used to make it. But a study appearing in the journal Current Biology shows that the making of a delicious cup of tea depends ...

Harnessing nanotechnology to understand tumor behavior

A new study conducted by pre-Ph.D. researcher Pablo S. Valera demonstrates the potential of surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) to explore metabolites secreted by cancer cells in cancer research.

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Metabolite

Metabolites are the intermediates and products of metabolism. The term metabolite is usually restricted to small molecules. A primary metabolite is directly involved in normal growth, development, and reproduction. Alcohol is an example of a primary metabolite produced in large-scale by industrial microbiology. A secondary metabolite is not directly involved in those processes, but usually has an important ecological function. Examples include antibiotics and pigments. Some antibiotics use primary metabolites as precursors, such as actinomycin which is created from the primary metabolite, tryptophan.

Examples of primary metabolites produced by industrial microbiology:

The metabolome forms a large network of metabolic reactions, where outputs from one enzymatic chemical reaction are inputs to other chemical reactions.

Metabolites from chemical compounds, whether inherent or pharmaceutical, are formed as part of the natural biochemical process of degrading and eliminating the compounds. The rate of degradation of a compound is an important determinant of the duration and intensity of its action. Profiling metabolites of pharmaceutical compounds, drug metabolism, is an important part of drug discovery, leading to an understanding of any undesirable side effects.

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