The turning wheel: a study in steady states.

Subject to the limitation of one-step transitions, a system composed of a polyfunctional macromolecule (say a polyfunctional enzyme), present in fixed amount together with its ligands (substrates) in a fixed volume, can be represented by an r-dimensional cube of which each of the 2r corners corresponds to one of the microscopically different forms. In the steady state we may predict circulation of the macromolecule around the edges of the cube. This would provide a molecular mechanism whereby one enzymatic reaction could drive another, the enzyme itself acting as a transducer. Such a system is asymptotically stable and subject to a set of linkage relations derivable by the cofactor principle from the steady state equations.