Functions of Alternative Terminal Oxidases is a collection of papers from the 11th meeting of the Federation of European Biochemical Societies in Copenhagen in 1977. The book opens with a review of the alternate electron transport mechanism to the main phosphorylating respiratory chain. One paper presents the respiration of mutant stains of Neurospora crassa treated with chloramphenicol that results in three distinct pathways distinguishable by the use of inhibitors. Another paper outlines the testing methods to determine the parameters controlling cyanide-insensitive respiration in Acanthamoeba castellanii and notes the physiological function of this insensitivity. The book then explains that this phenomenon of cyanide-insensitive respiration is common among yeasts, and such pathway of electron transport to oxygen that is insensitive to cyanide or antimycin is well founded in many higher plants and microorganisms. One paper then investigates the terminal oxidases found in two stages in the life cycle of trypanosomes, which cause African sleeping sickness. Another paper notes that a study of the energy metabolism of End. magnusii, a kind of yeast, showed no glucose repression, no alternative oxidation pathway, and no cyanide-insensitive pathway was normally present. The text will be of interest to those whose work involves these organisms, and to researchers, professors, and students whose disciplines are in developmental biology, micro-biology, or cellular biology.
