Overview diagram of E. colimetabolism. Each node in the diagram represents a single metabolite whose chemical class is encoded by the shape of the node. Each blue line represents a single bioreaction. The white lines connect multiple occurrences of the same metabolite in the diagram. (A) This version of the overview shows all interconnections between occurrences of the same metabolite to communicate the complexity of the interconnections in the metabolic network. (B) In this version many of the metabolite interconnections have been removed to simplify the diagram; those reaction steps for which an enzyme that catalyzes the reaction is known to have a physiologically relevant activator or inhibitor are highlighted.