Europe PMC

This website requires cookies, and the limited processing of your personal data in order to function. By using the site you are agreeing to this as outlined in our privacy notice and cookie policy.

Living with water stress: evolution of osmolyte systems.

Science, 01 Sep 1982, 217(4566):1214-1222
https://doi.org/10.1126/science.7112124 PMID: 7112124 

Abstract 

Striking convergent evolution is found in the properties of the organic osmotic solute (osmolyte) systems observed in bacteria, plants, and animals. Polyhydric alcohols, free amino acids and their derivatives, and combinations of urea and methylamines are the three types of osmolyte systems found in all water-stressed organisms except the halobacteria. The selective advantages of the organic osmolyte systems are, first, a compatibility with macromolecular structure and function at high or variable (or both) osmolyte concentrations, and, second, greatly reduced needs for modifying proteins to function in concentrated intracellular solutions. Osmolyte compatibility is proposed to result from the absence of osmolyte interactions with substrates and cofactors, and the nonperturbing or favorable effects of osmolytes on macromolecular-solvent interactions.

Full text links 

Read article at publisher's site: https://doi.org/10.1126/science.7112124

Citations & impact 

Impact metrics

1,494
Citations
Jump to Citations

Citations of article over time

Alternative metrics

Altmetric item for https://www.altmetric.com/details/7381340
Altmetric
Discover the attention surrounding your research
https://www.altmetric.com/details/7381340

Smart citations by scite.ai
Smart citations by scite.ai include citation statements extracted from the full text of the citing article. The number of the statements may be higher than the number of citations provided by EuropePMC if one paper cites another multiple times or lower if scite has not yet processed some of the citing articles.
Explore citation contexts and check if this article has been supported or disputed.
https://scite.ai/reports/10.1126/science.7112124

Supporting
Mentioning
Contrasting
48
2466
6

Article citations

Go to all (1,494) article citations

Similar Articles 

To arrive at the top five similar articles we use a word-weighted algorithm to compare words from the Title and Abstract of each citation.