Thiamine triphosphate (ThTP) is a biomolecule found in most organisms including

bacteria Bacteria (; singular: bacterium) are ubiquitous, mostly free-living organisms often consisting of one biological cell. They constitute a large domain of prokaryotic microorganisms. Typically a few micrometres in length, bacteria were among ...

fungi A fungus ( : fungi or funguses) is any member of the group of eukaryotic organisms that includes microorganisms such as yeasts and molds, as well as the more familiar mushrooms. These organisms are classified as a kingdom, separately from ...

plant Plants are predominantly photosynthetic eukaryotes of the kingdom Plantae. Historically, the plant kingdom encompassed all living things that were not animals, and included algae and fungi; however, all current definitions of Plantae exclud ...

s and

animal Animals are multicellular, eukaryotic organisms in the Kingdom (biology), biological kingdom Animalia. With few exceptions, animals Heterotroph, consume organic material, Cellular respiration#Aerobic respiration, breathe oxygen, are Motilit ...

s. Chemically, it is the

triphosphate Polyphosphates are salts or esters of polymeric oxyanions formed from tetrahedral PO4 (phosphate) structural units linked together by sharing oxygen atoms. Polyphosphates can adopt linear or a cyclic ring structures. In biology, the polyphosphate e ...

derivative In mathematics, the derivative of a function of a real variable measures the sensitivity to change of the function value (output value) with respect to a change in its argument (input value). Derivatives are a fundamental tool of calculus. F ...

of the vitamin

thiamine Thiamine, also known as thiamin and vitamin B1, is a vitamin, an essential micronutrient, that cannot be made in the body. It is found in food and commercially synthesized to be a dietary supplement or medication. Phosphorylated forms of thi ...

Function

It has been proposed that ThTP has a specific role in nerve excitability, but this has never been confirmed and recent results suggest that ThTP probably plays a role in cell energy metabolism. Low or absent levels of thiamine triphosphate have been found in Leighs disease. In '' E. coli'', ThTP is accumulated in the presence of

glucose Glucose is a simple sugar with the molecular formula . Glucose is overall the most abundant monosaccharide, a subcategory of carbohydrates. Glucose is mainly made by plants and most algae during photosynthesis from water and carbon dioxide, using ...

during

amino acid Amino acids are organic compounds that contain both amino and carboxylic acid functional groups. Although hundreds of amino acids exist in nature, by far the most important are the alpha-amino acids, which comprise proteins. Only 22 alpha am ...

starvation. On the other hand, suppression of the carbon source leads to the accumulation, of adenosine thiamine triphosphate (AThTP).

Metabolism

It has been shown that in brain ThTP is synthesized in mitochondria by a chemiosmotic mechanism, perhaps similar to

ATP synthase ATP synthase is a protein that catalyzes the formation of the energy storage molecule adenosine triphosphate (ATP) using adenosine diphosphate (ADP) and inorganic phosphate (Pi). It is classified under ligases as it changes ADP by the formation ...

. In

mammals Mammals () are a group of vertebrate animals constituting the class Mammalia (), characterized by the presence of mammary glands which in females produce milk for feeding (nursing) their young, a neocortex (a region of the brain), fur or ...

, ThTP is hydrolyzed to

thiamine pyrophosphate Thiamine pyrophosphate (TPP or ThPP), or thiamine diphosphate (ThDP), or cocarboxylase is a thiamine (vitamin B1) derivative which is produced by the enzyme thiamine diphosphokinase. Thiamine pyrophosphate is a cofactor that is present in all liv ...

(ThDP) by a specific

thiamine-triphosphatase Thiamine-triphosphatase is an enzyme involved in thiamine metabolism. It catalyzes the chemical reaction :thiamine triphosphate + H2O \rightleftharpoons thiamine diphosphate + phosphate This enzyme belongs to the family of acid anhydride hydr ...

. It can also be converted into ThDP by

thiamine-diphosphate kinase In enzymology, a thiamine-diphosphate kinase is an enzyme involved in thiamine metabolism. It catalyzes the chemical reaction :thiamine diphosphate + ATP \rightleftharpoons thiamine triphosphate + ADP Thus, the two substrates of this enzyme a ...

History

Thiamine triphosphate (ThTP) was chemically synthesized in 1948 at a time when the only organic

known was ATP. The first claim of the existence of ThTP in living organisms was made in rat liver, followed by baker’s yeast. Its presence was later confirmed in rat tissues and in plants germs, but not in seeds, where thiamine was essentially unphosphorylated. In all those studies, ThTP was separated from other thiamine derivatives using a paper chromatographic method, followed by

oxidation Redox (reduction–oxidation, , ) is a type of chemical reaction in which the oxidation states of substrate change. Oxidation is the loss of electrons or an increase in the oxidation state, while reduction is the gain of electrons or a d ...

in fluorescent

thiochrome Thiochrome (TChr)is a tricyclic organic compound that arises from the oxidation of the vitamin thiamine. Being highly fluorescent, it is often the derivative that is quantified in the analysis of thiamine. The oxidation can be effected with ceric ...

compounds with

ferricyanide Ferricyanide is the anion e(CN)6sup>3−. It is also called hexacyanoferrate(III) and in rare, but systematic nomenclature, hexacyanidoferrate(III). The most common salt of this anion is potassium ferricyanide, a red crystalline material that ...

alkaline In chemistry, an alkali (; from ar, القلوي, al-qaly, lit=ashes of the saltwort) is a base (chemistry), basic, ionic compound, ionic salt (chemistry), salt of an alkali metal or an alkaline earth metal. An alkali can also be defined as ...

solution. This method is at best semi-quantitative, and the development of liquid chromatographic methods suggested that ThTP represents far less than 10% of total thiamine in animal tissues.{{Cite journal , author1=Rindi G. , author2=de Giuseppe L. , name-list-style=amp , year = 1961 , title = A new chromatographic method for the determination of thiamine and its mono-, di- and triphosphates in animal tissues , journal = Biochem. J. , volume = 78 , issue=3 , pages = 602–606 , pmid = 13741738 , pmc = 1205381 , doi=10.1042/bj0780602

References

Biomolecules Organophosphates Thiazoles Thiamine Pyrimidines Phosphate esters