Preferential Utilization of Cellobiose by Thermomonospora curvata

Thermomonospora curvata was cultivated on mineral salts medium containing glucose and cellobiose under conditions that increasingly favored the uptake of glucose. In each case cellobiose was utilized in preference to glucose and induced beta-glucosidase and endoglucanase activity. [C]glucose metabolism studies indicated that cellobiose was not cleaved by extracellular beta-glucosidase and transported as glucose. No evidence of cellobiose phosphorylase or a cellobiose-specific phosphoenolpyruvate-phosphotransferase system was observed.