Metabolic Structure and Regulation: A Neoclassical Approach

There is a renewed interest in the fundamentals of energy metabolism, yet most people base their understanding on the views of generalists expressed in elementary textbooks. New techniques that enable analysis of thousands of metabolites provide useful data, but do not themselves substitute for an understanding of the fundamentals of metabolism. While classical ideas of metabolism are also valuable, some earlier ideas have not withstood further investigation. This book presents a personal philosophy but rests on what is broadly accepted by metabolic biochemists over the past few decades.

Raymond S. Ochs is a biochemist with a career-long specialty in metabolism spanning 30 years. Previously, he has written the textbook Biochemistry, contributed the metabolism chapters to another text, Principles of Biochemistry, and co-edited a collection of articles published as Metabolic Regulation. His research interests concern major pathways of liver and muscle, including glycolysis, gluconeogenesis, ureogenesis, fatty acid metabolism, glycogen metabolism, and control by cAMP, Ca2+, diacylglycerol, and AMPK. He is currently professor of pharmacy at St. John’s University in New York, teaching biochemistry, physiology, and medicinal chemistry.