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Glycolysis: A Poem
by Alec Adams

Glycolysis always just starts with glucose,
In the cytosol, now glucose where do you go?
It could fly away, to the extracellular space,
But it gets phosphorylated by hexokinase,
It costs ATP, to make G-6-P,
But now it's trapped in the cell, and can proceed,
If there's plenty of ATP, and insulin,
Then we've got the conditions to make glycogen,
Product inhibition by HK's alright,
But we need ATP: we isomerize...
To fructose-6-phosphate, are you listening yet?
Cause PFK's the rate limiting step,
Inhibited yes, by allosterically fitting,
And changing the enzyme, it's finicky, this could be...
From PCr, ATP and apparently,
Citrate and H plus also works merrily,
To enhance, the rate take a stance,
With ADP, AMP, Pi and dance,
One last time, ATP is consumed,
To make fructose-1-6-diphosphate, it's all true,
That 6 carbon has to go, all the way,
To 3 carbon backbones, by aldolase,
Making dihydroxyacetone, phosphate,
And to the other 3-C backbone it can go,
And isomerize,

To 3-phosphoglyceraldehyde,
With Pi, the enzyme, is a dehydrogenase ,
It always makes NADH, and that's all it takes,
But wait, we added a phosphate to the substrate,
1-3-diphosphoglycerate,

We find ways with a kinase for ATP making,
The next enzyme catalyzes substrate phosphorylating,
are we even with ATP? you can believe it,
Make 3-phosphoglycerate and kinase does speed it,
Then we do make 2-phosphoglycerate with a mutase,
Which will enolize to phosphoenopyruvate,
Now for the "pay-off" as it's often called,
We get 2 ATP cause we double it alllllll....
Of it with pyruvate kinase we control,
The reaction it happens cause PEP makes it go,
But it goes slow with PCr and citrate,
2 net ATP in the end and that's great!

We've gone a long way, and by coming this far,
We make pyruvate and now here we are,
Are aerobic or anaerobic?
We can be both, whichever you pick,
At steady state or low intensity,
We predominantly do OP-ETC,
If we need energy fast we can run,
To LDH, and fermentation,
H+ is bad, but lactate is fuel,
It's used in the liver and muscle tissue,
It's a reduction reaction because,
We oxidize NADH and H+,
To cycle it back, as a cofactor,
For g-3-p-d, H know why it matters,
Hope you could follow it, that's all there is,
To explaining the basics of glycolysis!

The Alkane Pathway Explained Step by Step:

1. Hexokinase, alongside ATP, phosphorylates (adds a phosphate group to) a molecule of glucose, yielding ADP Glucose 6-Phosphate
2. Phosphoglucose Isomerase isomerizes (changes form of) Glucose 6-Phosphate into Fructose 6-Phosphate
3. Phosphofructokinase, alongside ATP, phosphorylates Fructose 6-Phosphate, yielding ADP and Fructose 1, 6-Biphosphate
4. Fructose Biphosphate Aldolase cleaves Fructose 1, 6-Biphosphate into Glyceraldehyde 3-Phosphate and Dihydroxyacetone Phosphate
5. Triosephosphate Isomerase isomerizes Dihydroxyacetone Phosphate into another Glyceraldehyde 3-Phosphate
6. Glyceraldehyde Phosphate Dehydrogenase, alondside NAD+ and H2(PO4), dehydrogenizes (removes hydrogen from) Glyceraldehyde 3-Phosphate, yielding NADH/H+ and 1, 3-Biphosphoglycerate
7. Phosphoglycerate Kinase, alongside ADP, dephosphorylates 1, 3-Biphosphoglycerate, yielding ATP and 3-Phosphoglycerate
8. Phosphoglycerate Mutase converts 3-Phosphoglycerate into 2-Phosphoglycerate
9. Enolase pulls a molecule of H2O from 2-Phosphoglycerate, yielding Phosphoenolpyruvate (PEP)
10. Pyruvate Kinase, alongside ADP and H+, dephosphorylates PEP, yielding ATP and Pyruvate
11. Pyruvate Dehydrogenase, alongside NAD+, dehydrogenizes Pyruvate, yielding NADH/H+ and Acetyl Coenzyme-A
12. Acetyl CoA Carboxylase, alongside ATP and a carboxyl group (H(CO3)), carboxylizes Acetyl CoA, yielding Malonyl Coenzyme-A
13. Beta-Ketoacyl-ACP Synthase and Acetyl CoA react with Malonyl CoA, yielding CO2 and Acetoacetyl-ACP
14. 2NADPH and Malonyl-ACP react with Acetoacetyl-ACP, facilitating hydrocarbon chain elongation, yielding CO2, NADP+, and Acyl-ACP
15. Acyl-ACP Reductase, alongside NADPH, reduces (changes the oxidation state of) Acyl-ACP, yielding NADP+ and Acyl-AH
16. Aldehyde Decarbonylase decarbonylizes (removes a carbonyl group (CO) from) Acyl-AH, yielding an Alkane