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ION Currents and Physiological Functions in Microorganisms

ION Currents and Physiological Functions in Microorganisms It takes a membrane to make sense out of disorder in biology, . . To stay alive you have to be able to hold out against equilibrium, maintain imbalance, bank against entropy, and you can only transact this business with membranes in our kind of world. Lewis Thomas, The Lives of a Cell. PUMPS, CARRIERS, CHANNELS, AND GATES That living things can generate electrical currents and potentials has been known since Galvani's day. Most bioelectric phenomena arise from the movement of ions across membranes in such a way as to produce an imbalance of electrical charge; the quantitative relationships between ion movements and electrical parameters 181 HAROLD have been thoroughly explored in systems as diverse as nerve axons, epithelial tissues, plant roots, and giant algae. As a result, electrophysiology is today one of the most sophisticated branches of biological science, but rather an arcane one, seemingly remote from the concerns of most biochemists or microbiologists. This comfortable apartheid has been shattered by developments in bioenergetics during the past decade: it has become clear that at the molecular level a central function of biological membranes is to generate gradients of ion concentration and electrical potential, and that many, though http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Annual Review of Microbiology Annual Reviews

ION Currents and Physiological Functions in Microorganisms

Harold, F M
Annual Review of Microbiology , Volume 31 (1) – Oct 1, 1977
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23 pages

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Publisher
Annual Reviews
Copyright
Copyright 1977 Annual Reviews. All rights reserved
Subject
Review Articles
ISSN
0066-4227
eISSN
1545-3251
DOI
10.1146/annurev.mi.31.100177.001145
pmid
334038
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

It takes a membrane to make sense out of disorder in biology, . . To stay alive you have to be able to hold out against equilibrium, maintain imbalance, bank against entropy, and you can only transact this business with membranes in our kind of world. Lewis Thomas, The Lives of a Cell. PUMPS, CARRIERS, CHANNELS, AND GATES That living things can generate electrical currents and potentials has been known since Galvani's day. Most bioelectric phenomena arise from the movement of ions across membranes in such a way as to produce an imbalance of electrical charge; the quantitative relationships between ion movements and electrical parameters 181 HAROLD have been thoroughly explored in systems as diverse as nerve axons, epithelial tissues, plant roots, and giant algae. As a result, electrophysiology is today one of the most sophisticated branches of biological science, but rather an arcane one, seemingly remote from the concerns of most biochemists or microbiologists. This comfortable apartheid has been shattered by developments in bioenergetics during the past decade: it has become clear that at the molecular level a central function of biological membranes is to generate gradients of ion concentration and electrical potential, and that many, though

Journal

Annual Review of Microbiology – Annual Reviews

Published: Oct 1, 1977

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