Metabolism of pyrimidines in relativelly advanced organisms

Pyrimidine nucleotides play a central role in cellular metabolism and regulatory processes. In relatively advanced organisms three pathways participate in determination of the size of the pyrimidine pool: the six-step de novo biosynthetic pathway, the salvage pathway, and a three-step pathway that catabolizes pyrimidines to beta-alanine. The aim of this project is to characterize structural and regulatory genes, as well as the corresponding proteins, in relatively advanced organisms.
Two model organisms, the fruit fly and yeast, are studied. Several mutants have been isolated and studied by a genetic and molecular biology approach.