Determinants of Standard

Metabolic
rate
BTP Mid sem Report(BBD451)
Submitted by:
Nikhil Kumar Saiyam
2017BB10022
Under the guidance of

Prof. Sunil Nath

Department of
-------- Biochemical and Biotechnology-------
IIT Delhi
November 2020
2 DECLARATION

I certify that :

a) the work contained in this report is original and has been done
by me under the guidance of my supervisor(s).

b) I have followed the guidelines provided by the Department in

preparing the report.

c) I have conformed to the norms and guidelines given in the

Honor Code of Conduct of the Institute.

d) whenever I have used materials (data, theoretical analysis,

figures, and text) from other sources, I have given due credit to
them by citing them in the text of the report and giving their
details in the references. Further, I have taken permission from
the copyright owners of the sources, whenever necessary.

Signed by: NIKHIL KUMAR SAIYAM

3 CERTIFICATE

It is certified that the work contained in this report titled

“Determinants of Standard Metabolic rate” is the original work
done by Nikhil Kumar Saiyam and has been carried out
under my supervision.

Signed by: Prof. SUNIL NATH

Date :18/11/2020
4 Determinants of
Standard Metabolic Rate
ABSTRACT |Metabolic related research covers a wealth of
knowledge and information. This broad field encompasses a
number of number of states that are critical to study. This
basic process in living organism responsible for conversion
of food to energy for an organism.With advancements in
science we have gained much knowledge about
metabolism.Here we present the determinants of Standard
Metabolic Rate with more emphasis on the Contribution of
the Leak of Protons Across the Mitochondrial Inner
Membrane to Standard Metabolic Rate.We further
investigate about the “leak of protons” effect on overall
efficiency of Standard Metabolic Rate . Our study involves
chain of reactions responsible for heat generation and so for
the Standard Metabolic Reaction as well as oxygen
consumption and inside mitochondrial activities . The
method used by us is Derived methodology which involves
aggregation of various data points and observing new results
.We hope that these results provide not only critical
knowledge needed for clinical care and daily life, but also a
platform for the continuing expansion of research into
Standard Metablic Rate .
5
Table of contents
Declaration 2
Certificate 3
Abstract 4
Table of content 5
List of Tables 6
List of figures 7
Acronym 8

Chapter 1 : Introduction
1.1 - Introduction 9
1.2 - Objective and Motivation 10

Chapter 2 : Literature Review

1.1- Intro 11
1.2- Metabolism 12
1.3- Glucose Metabolism cycle 14
1.4- Determinants of SMR 15

Chapter 3: Summary and conclusion 17

Chapter 4: References 18
 7
Figures

Pg.no

1. Metabolism 13

2. The physiological process of glucose metabolism 14

8
Abbreviation

SMR - Standard metabolic rate

BMR - Basal metabolic rate
ETC - Electron transport chain reaction
GLUTs- Glucose Transporter
TPP - Thiamine pyrophosphate
KGHDC- Krebs tricarboxylic acid cycle
ATP- Adenosine triphosphate
9
Chapter 1
Introduction

Metabolic rate refers to all overall rate of tissue oxidation of

fuels by the body organs with carbohydrate, fat, alcohol,
protein and other minors being the dietary fuels. Metabolic
rate varies with the activity level of an organism with more
activity level there is more metabolism. Metabolism just refers
to the total sum of biochemical reactions that take place in an
organism. The baseline metabolic rate of an animal is
measured as SMR for ectotherm and BMR for endotherm.
Both SMR and BMR are measure of metabolic rate for animal
in rest/calm state with no active digestion of food . SMR is
usually measured as rate of oxygen consumption except in
case of anaerobic organisms . SMR can also vary while
animals are sleeping and hibernating . It oxygen consumption
is measured in two components, oxygen consumption required
to drive metabolic reaction carried out by resting cells and
oxygen consumption required to drive the mechanical
process.In this article we would analyse the determinants of
SMR along with underlying effect of leak of Protons Across the
Mitochondrial Inner Membrane to SMR.
10
Objective
The objectives of this study is to review the terminology and
methods associated with the concept of SMR. As there is no
accepted method in the specific case when activity level is
unknown during the measurement of SMR, the review part of
the paper will followed by an experimental part that aims at
comparing the most often used methods and make
recommendations.

Objectives -

To study about SMR and metabolism.

To Find new relationships between SMR and maximal

metabolic rate.

To study and research about determinants of SMR.

11
Chapter 2
Literature review

The molecular origin of standard metabolic rate and

thermogenesis in mammals is examined. It is pointed out
that there are important differences and distinctions
between the cellular reactions that 1) couple to oxygen
consumption, 2) uncouple metabolism, 3) hydrolyze ATP, 4)
control metabolic rate, 5) regulate metabolic rate, 6) produce
heat, and 7) dissipate free energy. The quantitative
contribution of different cellular reactions to these processes
is assessed in mammals.In mammals, it is estimated that
90% of cellular oxygen consumption takes place in the
mitochondria(Rolfe & Brown,1997). Subsistence living allows
for no activity, digestion, growth or production of sexual
products, but merely supports essential homeostatic
activities for cells and whole organisms (Brett,1962).(J Thior
biol, 1990) article suggests that in rats only 10-15 % of
oxygen consumption remains after inhibition of mitochondrial
respiration thus this may be linked to non mitochondrial
reactions while rest of the oxygen which is consumed by
cells in animals is reduced to water by ETC in mitochondria.
12
Prusiner and poe(1968) tells us that nearly all heat is
produced after generation of mitochondrial substrates NADH
and reduced flavoprotein. From these two values they
concluded that the mitochondrial reactions coupling electron
transport to ATP synthesis must be directly responsible for
about 75% of the heat produced during metabolism even
with tightly coupled mitochondria. If these values are correct
then oxidative phosphorylation will be responsible for 25 - 40
percent of total heat that makes up the SMR.Before moving
to experimentation first let us see the basic concept of
metabolism, SMR and all the process it involves.

Metabolism
Metabolism is the total amount of the biochemical reactions
involved in maintaining the living condition of the cells in an
organism. All living organisms require energy for different
essential processes and for producing new organic
substances. The process of metabolism depends upon the
type of nutrients that gets digested to produce energy
necessary to synthesis the important bio-molecules that our
body requires.
13

Fig2.1(Metabolism)

As we can see in the figure food act as a fuel and body’s energy
currency ATP is generated and heat is also radiated in this
process.Now let us move further inside the reaction in more
detail. The physiological process of glucose metabolism.
Glucose is transported into cells through GLUTs, and further
oxidized by different enzymes. Intracellular glucose metabolism
involves four pathways: Krebs cycle and oxidative
phosphorylation that occur in mitochondria, and pentose
phosphate pathway and glycolysis that take place in cytoplasm.
TPP is the co-enzyme of TK, PDHC, and KGDHC, which are all
rate-limiting of enzymes in glucose metabolism. The most
important factor to regulate glucose transport is insulin and its
receptor, which is marked by dotted line in figure 2.3
14

Figure 2.2 The physiological process of glucose metabolism

In the process above if heat production is significant before

NADH then heat production during during oxidative
phosphorylation will contribute less to SMR while the rest of
heat production will happen later following the production of
ATP.
15
Current estimates of thermodynamics efficiency of oxidative
phosphorylation suggestions that distribution of heat production
between ATP production process is divided between production
and consumption .

Determinants of SMR

There are three major factors which determine SMR in

animals ::

1. Body mass
2. Phylogeny
3. Thyroid hormones

Body mass :

Standard metabolic rate = a. (M)*0.75

More there will be mass of an animal more will be metabolic

activity to sustain . 0.75 is the scaling factor. Elevation
constant "a" has a value of about 70 if units of kcal day -~
and kg are used,
16
Phylogeny : Phylogeny works on phylogenetic assumption that
all living organisms share common ancestry. Its is based on
evolutionary relationships among different organisms.There has
been evidence of mammals having more mitochondrial inner
membrane per cm 3 of tissue correlating well with SMR.(Else et
al. 2004)
Thyroid Hormones : Thyroid hormones affect the SMR in
short period of time . There effects are :

They increase the organ and whole body content of

cytochromes.

They increase surface area of inner membrane per

mitochondrion and the total mitochondrial inner membrane
surface area in the body

Thus more thyroid hormones means more SMR .

Also there seems to be strong correlation

between SMR and surface area of
mitochondrial inner membrane.
 Chapter 3
Summary and conclusion

The topic of research is Determinants of SMR . I

have approached from metabolism and then
moved on to the glucose metabolism cycle and
then to the relation of SMR with thyroid
hormones, phylogeny and body mass these
determinants hints at the effect of inner
mitochondrial surface area to the SMR and also
to Maximal metabolic rate. Further I would take
example of an living organism and analyze
different aspects of SDR and its metabolism
with change in different parametres and
scenarios .
 References

1. Else, Paul L; Turner, N; Hulbert, A J:The

evolution of endothermy: role for membranes
and molecular
activity,http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/422767
2. Prusiner, S; Poe, Thermodynamic
considerations of mammalian thermogenesis

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/5684848

3. -Rolfe, D F; Brown, G C,Cellular energy

utilization and molecular origin of standard
metabolic rate in mammals

http://dx.doi.org/10.1152/physrev.1997.77.3.731

4. Brand, Martin D:The Contribution of the Leak

of Protons Across the Mitochondrial Inner
Membrane to Standard Metabolic Rate