Biological and Practical Function
The shikimate pathway synthesises aromatic amino acids as well as other aromatic compounds that have various involvement with processes such as "UV protection, electron transport, signaling, communication, plant defense, and the wound response". Moreover, the enzymes catalysing the Shikimate pathway may be potentially useful in the development of new herbicides and antibiotics. This is due to the fact that the shikimate pathway is not present in humans. It is, therefore, an ideal target for herbicides because chemicals used to inhibit the shikimate pathway should not have an effect on humans. Also, the products created by the shikimate pathway are essential to plant life, so, if the function of the pathway is inhibited, this has a fatal effect on the plant. The enzymes in the shikimate pathway, and chorismate synthase specifically,are also considered to be potential targets for new antimicrobial chemotherapy treatments for Mycobacterium tuberculosis. This is important since drugs resistant strains of M. tuberculosis continue to emerge. Studies have shown that the "shikimate pathway is essential for M. tuberculosis viability" making it an attractive target for new antimycobacterial agents.
Read more about this topic: Chorismate Synthase
Famous quotes containing the words biological, practical and/or function:
“Biological possibility and desire are not the same as biological need. Women have childbearing equipment. For them to choose not to use the equipment is no more blocking what is instinctive than it is for a man who, muscles or no, chooses not to be a weightlifter.”
—Betty Rollin (b. 1936)
“One of the great triumphs of the nineteenth century was to limit the connotation of the word “immoral” in such a way that, for practical purposes, only those were immoral who drank too much or made too copious love. Those who indulged in any or all of the other deadly sins could look down in righteous indignation on the lascivious and the gluttonous.... In the name of all lechers and boozers I most solemnly protest against the invidious distinction made to our prejudice.”
—Aldous Huxley (1894–1963)
““... The state’s one function is to give.
The bud must bloom till blowsy blown
Its petals loosen and are strown;
And that’s a fate it can’t evade
Unless ‘twould rather wilt than fade.””
—Robert Frost (1874–1963)