Kelly and Adams are first going to try to assemble the needed metabolic pathways in less extreme bugs like e. coli bacteria.

FORBES

The result is a set of synthetic metabolic pathways ones that do not exist in nature which turn the polymer out in satisfyingly large quantities.

ECONOMIST: Synthetic biology

This approach combined with the complexity of biological systems restricts current, one-off efforts to modifying only a small set of genes and constructing simple, isolated genetic circuits and metabolic pathways.

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Although many of the genes encoding El Tor's pathogenic machinery were already known, the new sequence does reveal a number of unexpected metabolic pathways that may prove useful for drug development, according to Dr Mekalanos.

ECONOMIST: The cholera genome

Anyone who knows feces from shoe polish about pharmacology knows that two chemically distinct compounds, despite the fact that they interact with a common target, often interact very differently (including not at all) with non-target metabolic and physiological pathways.

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