The MOST ABUNDANT PROTEIN ON EARTH is probably the one that almost all life depends on.
It makes up ~3% of the mass of every leaf & blade of grass on the planet: a total weight of 10^11 kg.
Let's talk about Ribulose-1,5-bisphosphate carboxylase/oxygenase or 'RuBisCO'.
https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.1816654116
It makes up ~3% of the mass of every leaf & blade of grass on the planet: a total weight of 10^11 kg.
Let's talk about Ribulose-1,5-bisphosphate carboxylase/oxygenase or 'RuBisCO'.
https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.1816654116
Comments
But here we encounter the problem:
RuBisCO isn't great at its job.
For one, it's SLOW...
There's a second problem:
RuBisCO evolved about 4 billion years ago, at a time before free atmospheric oxygen...
There are research programs underway to improve this key enzyme that would have the following benefits:
2. Increased crop yield & plant growth.
3. Expanded herbivore populations
Sounds nice, right?
Work is underway to catalog RuBisCO variants with the highest efficiency / CO2 specificity with a goal to engineer better plant metabolism.
You can read more here:
https://www.annualreviews.org/content/journals/10.1146/annurev-biochem-040320-101244
nah bro you can keep you ribs-15 and bis carboxylapsos to yourself