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Reminiscence of 40-year research on nitrogen metabolism

This article summarizes my research over 40 years. The main theme of my work is nitrogen metabolism of amino acids, though later I focused on protein turnover in the cell. In the first years of my research work, I was busy dissecting the pathways involved in the metabolism of certain amino acids and...

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Autor principal: ICHIHARA, Akira
Formato: Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: The Japan Academy 2010
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3066535/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20689229
http://dx.doi.org/10.2183/pjab.86.707
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author ICHIHARA, Akira
author_facet ICHIHARA, Akira
author_sort ICHIHARA, Akira
collection PubMed
description This article summarizes my research over 40 years. The main theme of my work is nitrogen metabolism of amino acids, though later I focused on protein turnover in the cell. In the first years of my research work, I was busy dissecting the pathways involved in the metabolism of certain amino acids and their related enzymes. Then I became interested in the physiology and regulation of matabolism of these amino acids. For that, I used primary cultured hepatocytes, which contain many liver-specific enzymes. However, this play field was very rough around 1970 and hence I had to smooth them (differentiated) first. We discovered a specific growth factor (hepatocyte growth factor, HGF) in rat platelets. Exceptionally, I also worked on branched chain amino acids (valine, leucine and isoleucine). These amino acids are not efficiently metabolized in the liver, so I had to consider the physiology of extrahepatic tissues as well. Finally, I came across a huge protease complex, the proteasome. Whether these players, small amino acid metabolizing enzymes and the huge protease complex, danced well in harmony on my playground or not, I still do not know.
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spelling pubmed-30665352011-06-03 Reminiscence of 40-year research on nitrogen metabolism ICHIHARA, Akira Proc Jpn Acad Ser B Phys Biol Sci Review This article summarizes my research over 40 years. The main theme of my work is nitrogen metabolism of amino acids, though later I focused on protein turnover in the cell. In the first years of my research work, I was busy dissecting the pathways involved in the metabolism of certain amino acids and their related enzymes. Then I became interested in the physiology and regulation of matabolism of these amino acids. For that, I used primary cultured hepatocytes, which contain many liver-specific enzymes. However, this play field was very rough around 1970 and hence I had to smooth them (differentiated) first. We discovered a specific growth factor (hepatocyte growth factor, HGF) in rat platelets. Exceptionally, I also worked on branched chain amino acids (valine, leucine and isoleucine). These amino acids are not efficiently metabolized in the liver, so I had to consider the physiology of extrahepatic tissues as well. Finally, I came across a huge protease complex, the proteasome. Whether these players, small amino acid metabolizing enzymes and the huge protease complex, danced well in harmony on my playground or not, I still do not know. The Japan Academy 2010-07-21 /pmc/articles/PMC3066535/ /pubmed/20689229 http://dx.doi.org/10.2183/pjab.86.707 Text en © 2010 The Japan Academy This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
spellingShingle Review
ICHIHARA, Akira
Reminiscence of 40-year research on nitrogen metabolism
title Reminiscence of 40-year research on nitrogen metabolism
title_full Reminiscence of 40-year research on nitrogen metabolism
title_fullStr Reminiscence of 40-year research on nitrogen metabolism
title_full_unstemmed Reminiscence of 40-year research on nitrogen metabolism
title_short Reminiscence of 40-year research on nitrogen metabolism
title_sort reminiscence of 40-year research on nitrogen metabolism
topic Review
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3066535/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20689229
http://dx.doi.org/10.2183/pjab.86.707
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