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Describe the Entner-Doudoroff (ED) pathway. What are the

advantages to microorganisms that encode enzymes in the ED
pathway?

1 Answer

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Answer:

Entner-Doudoroff (ED) pathway is the pathway is a series of chain reaction which converts the glucose molecule to pyruvate unlike in the glycolysis where the glucose is converted to phosphoenolpyruvate.

The enzymes used in the ED pathway are different from the enzymes used in the PPP pathway and glycolysis. The pathways are used by the gram-negative bacteria and archaea and few gram-positive bacteria.

The ED pathway produces only 1 ATP, 1 NADPH and 1 NADH therefore the microbes which use this process are aerobic microbes.

The ED pathway is used by the microbes which lack the enzymes for the glycolysis process like Rhizobium, Azotobacter, Pseudomonas and others. Since this is an alternative method to produce energy molecule which lacks the glycolytic enzymes therefore this is an advantage to certain microbes.

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