New Beer in an Old Bottle. Eduard Buchner and the Growth of Biochemical Knowledge

We should commemorate the centenary of Buchner's discovery not only because of its inherent importance and interest, but also because vitalist ways of thinking have by no means disappeared, and modern biologists need to be constantly on their guard agaisnt them. Far worse than vitalism, which in Pasteur's hands was, after all, based on rational interpretation of apparently coherent observations, the past few decades have seen the return of obscurantist mysticism in the formo f socalled "creation science" and other abuses of the intellect. Forgetting the history of biology is no way to combat these, ant they provide another reason why it is worthwhile to recall how our current ideas cam into existence.

CONTENTS
Contributors
Preface, by Athel Cornish-Bowden
PART I:
BUCHNER’S ARTICLE
1. Alkoholische Gährung ohne Hefezellen, by Eduard Buchner
2. Alcoholic Fermentation without Yeast Cells, by Eduard Buchner (translated by Herbert C. Friedmann)
3. Fermentación Alcohólica sin Células de Levadura, por Eduard Buchner (traducido por José M. López Piñero)
PART II:
HISTORICAL CONTEXT
4. Early Research on Fermentation – a Story of Missed Opportunities, by Fritz Schelenk
5. A Prize-winning Discovery of 1896: Buchner Provides Evidence of Cell-free Fermentation, by Peter Bohley and Kai-Uwe Fröhlich
6. Centenary of the Birth of Modern Biochemistry, by Arthur Kornberg
7. From Friedrich Wöhler’s Urine to Eduard Buchner’s Alcohol, by Herbert C. Friedmann
8. Elizabeth Fulhame and the Discovery of Catalysis: 100 Years before Buchner, by Keith J. Laidler and Athel Cornish-Bowden
9. A Brief History of Enzyme Kinetics, by Keith J. Laidler
10. Harden and Young’s Discovery of Fructose 1,6-bisphosphate, by Athel Cornish-Bowden
PART III:
THE MODERN STUDY OF MULTI-ENZYME SYSTEMS
11. Glycolysis in Cell-free Systems, by Robert K. Scopes
12. Metabolic Cascades: an Evolutionary Strategy for an Integrated and Sensitive Response to Multiple Signals, by María Luz Cárdenas.
13. Enzyme Evolution and the Development of Metabolic Pathways, by Juli Peretó, Renato Fani, José Ignacio Leguina and Antonio Lazcano
14. Organization and Regulation of Metabolism, by Analogy with the Industrial Manufacturing World, by Marta Cascante and Enric Martí
15. Prospects for Pharmacological Manipulation of Metabolism, by Athel Cornish-Bowden and Robert Eisenthal
16. Anaerobic Energy Metabolism in Yeast as a Supply-Demand System, by Jan-Hendrik S. Hofmeyr
Index