Citric Acid Cycle

Citric acid cycle
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Overview of the citric acid cycle
The citric acid cycle — also known as the tricarboxylic acid cycle (TCA cycle), the Krebs cycle, or the Szent-Györgyi-Krebs cycle, [1][2] — is a series of enzyme-catalysed chemical reactions, which is of central importance in all living cells that use oxygen as part of cellular respiration. In eukaryotic cells, the citric acid cycle occurs in the matrix of the mitochondrion. The components and reactions of the citric acid cycle were established by seminal work from Albert Szent-Györgyi and Hans Krebs.
In aerobic organisms, the citric acid cycle is part of a metabolic pathway involved in the chemical conversion of carbohydrates, fats and proteins into carbon dioxide and water to generate a form of usable energy. Other relevant reactions in the pathway include those in glycolysis and pyruvate oxidation before the citric acid cycle, and oxidative phosphorylation after it. In addition, it provides precursors for many compounds including some amino acids and is therefore functional even in cells performing fermentation.
|Contents |
|[hide] |
|1 A simplified view of the process |
|2 Steps |
|3 Products |
|4 Regulation |
|5 Major metabolic pathways converging on the TCA cycle |
|6 Interactive pathway map |
|7 See also |
|8 Notes