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Microbes represent the greatest reservoir of genetic and biochemical diversity on the planet.
They drive the chemistry of life, do much of the biogeochemical cycling that keeps the world habitable, and even affect the global climate. Over billions of years, microbes have developed a wealth of functions that enable their survival in virtually every environmental niche, often where no other life forms exist. Knowledge about the metabolic and regulatory pathways of microbes and their communities will provide the foundation to begin understanding and using their remarkable capabilities, especially those related to environmental remediation, biogeochemical cycles, climate changes, and energy production. Metabolic maps provide a framework for studying the consequences of genotype changes and the relationships between genotypes and phenotypes. This metabolic network model for Escherichia coli incorporated data on 436 metabolic intermediates undergoing 720 possible enzyme-catalyzed reactions.