![constant flux constant flux](https://en.minghui.org/u/article_images/2022-5-20-spain-barcelona-02.jpg)
Metabolic flux is part of undergraduate biochemistry instruction only in a few isolated cases, perhaps dependent on the instructor. I realized that we were only scratching the surface. A group of talented and driven educators of undergraduates exposed me to the world of teaching and suggested that we include instructions to educators, add illustrations of a few individual pathways before showing an integrated view with all pathways, connect the material to examples used in classrooms and make sure not to overwhelm students with complexity. We received an overwhelming response and realized that science instructors need reimagined visualization in metabolism. We harnessed the power of social media - Janet Iwasa’s Twitter community - to find potential educator collaborators who would provide input on the lesson. Thus was born the idea of a short lesson around this animation: “The Journey of a Metabolite.”Ī glimpse of the pilot animation shows carbon flux from glucose and glutamine through central carbon metabolic pathways. But could it be used to teach the concept of metabolic flux to trainees and students? However, we soon realized this might not be useful to them if they are unable to customize flux input and pathways for their own research study. I excitedly presented it to our scientist collaborators. I developed a pilot animation of carbon flux through the central carbon metabolic pathways using flux data from published research. This was not a new concept metabolism educators often use Google maps and traffic to convey the concept of flow of metabolites through networks. I was inspired to revisualize and use roads as a pathway guide to the viewer. Naturally, I envisioned carbon from glucose moving from outside the cell to different compartments or through various pathways. The New York Times came up with a remarkable visualization showing the flow of infected people from Wuhan, China, to neighboring countries and other parts of the world. I began to see COVID-19–related data visualizations in public media. Change in fluxĪnd then we were enveloped by the pandemic. She tried out a few ordered and disordered arrangements of pathways as well. She experimented with 3D and 2D structures of metabolites and colors to represent them. Note a few depictions of flow in terms of the path metabolites follow. The author made these snapshots while she planned and explored. Thus began my own journey to imagine a way to do that.įor a couple of months, some questions floated around in my mind: How do I represent metabolites? How do I depict cellular compartments? How do I show flow - would trails be formed by the metabolites? Should I make the pathways random, as they are in reality, or should I follow current conventions? For example, should I use a circle to represent the tricarboxylic acid cycle, something biochemists are already familiar with? I wanted to keep the audience in mind and consider what would be most intuitive or useful to them. Ducker and Jared Rutter at the University of Utah School of Medicine were interested in visualizing how flux changes during cancer. Greg Ducker, one of our scientist collaborators who studies flux, emphasized this. Although mathematical tools exist to compute flux and visualize it in the context of complex pathways, there is no simple way to visualize metabolites’ dynamic journeys intuitively. Although metabolic flux was unfamiliar territory, the biochemist in me leaped at the opportunity.Ī subset of biochemists studies metabolic flux, tracing metabolites through biochemical pathways in our bodies how they travel through these pathways can change as conditions change, especially during disease. As soon as I joined the Animation Lab at the University of Utah Department of Biochemistry in early 2019, Janet Iwasa, the head of the lab, challenged me to visualize the flow of metabolites.