Metabolism at a Glance Book

Metabolism is a complicated subject involving complex molecules and interrelated pathways. These pathways are usually taught separately with the result that the student develops a detailed but compartmentalized approach to metabolism and frequently fails to see the overall picture and its physiological significance.

Metabolism at a Glance uses a novel approach to take the student through a complete course in intermediary metabolism in an integrated manner. This is achieved by a series of large two-page spreads treating each metabolic process in turn. A complete metabolic chart is repeated throughout the book on every right-hand page from which a different pathway is highlighted in colour on each two-page opening. The pathway under study is explained in basic biochemical terms on the left-hand page. In this way, each metabolic pathway is discussed in turn and its context in the overall metabolic chart is pointed out. The left-hand pages also contain two-colour illustrations showing the anatomical and physiological context of the pathway.

The book covers both aerobic and anaerobic glucose metabolism, oxidative phosphorylation, fatty acid synthesis, the pentose phosphate pathway, gluconeogenesis, fatty acid oxidation, metabolism of the ketone bodies, elongation and desaturation of fatty acids, peroxisomal B-oxidation, the urea cycle, biosynthesis and catabolism of amino acids, folate metabolism, purine and pyrimidine metabolism. Areas of clinical interest include: cancer, diabetes, amino acid disorders, polyols and cataract formation, and alcohol metabolism.

The book will be an invaluable revision aid to those students requiring a knowledge of metabolism for undergraduate medical, biochemistry, veterinary and nutrition courses. It will also serve the purpose of a concise overview of the subject for those students in related areas, and for biological/medical scientists who need to refresh their knowledge quickly.

The book contains both black-and-white and color illustrations.