ABSTRACT

Experimental evidences for the macromolecular association of enzymatic components have been accumulating during the last decades, but just recently the concept of ‘metabolon’ is gaining further unequivocal support. The biochemical concept of ‘substrate channeling’ implies notable physiological advantages at the cellular level, such as improved metabolic efficiency, protection of labile compounds, compartmentation of toxic intermediates, enhanced enzymatic stability and optimized enzymatic adaptation to challenging environmental conditions. Recent advances in the field of genomics and proteomics offer a fabulous new perspective to the elucidation of enzymatic complexes, with a large panoply of useful techniques to identify both the presence of metabolons as well as the consequences of genetically-directed alterations. The first examples if metabolon formation in plant cells are just being documented at the molecular level, and the use of novel proteomic and genomic techniques foresee a large increase in the description of cellular processes with metabolon participation.