Bacteria face trade-offs in the decomposition of complex biopolymers
Fig 3
Differences in the dynamics of release of monomers by exo and endo-enzymes.
(A) Comparison between depolymerization dynamics of exo and endo-enzymes, the system starts with M = 300 nmol/mm3 of monomers all connected into chains of size n = 200 (i.e. the concentration of polymers in the initial pool is Nn(t0) = 1.5 nmol/mm3). Tdeg indicates the time until the available pool of substrate is fully degraded. Note Tdeg is shorter for endo-enzymes. (B) Monomer release by exo- (in concentration Ce = 3 nmol C/mm3) and (C) endo-enzymes (Ce = 3 nmol C/mm3), with same turnover rates kexo = kendo = 0.82 nmol nmol C−1 h−1, for different initial concentrations of polymers (in nmol /mm3) of size n = 200, note the differences in the final amount of monomers obtained. The solid lines in (A, B, C) represent the monomer release dynamics for identical initial pools.