Metabolic functions of oxygen

From 1930 to 1960 intensive work was focused on the question of how oxygen produces energy. As a result, the citrate cycle and the structure of the respiration chain were discovered during this period.

Famous names linked with these discoveries are Otto Warburg and Sir Hans Krebs.

In differentiated tissues in the presence of oxygen, glucose is converted to pyruvate that is further degraded to CO2 with the production of 38 moles of ATP per mole of glucose.

 

Therefore, the major function of oxygen is

the detoxification of hydrogen, whereby energy is produced.

 

References

Metabolic strategies of tumors for survival under low oxygen supply

Glutaminolysis and the truncated citrate cycle

Oxygen: main page