Several species of aerobic bacteria owe their ability to grow on L-threonine as sole source of carbon atoms and energy to their possession of an L-threonine dehydrogenase; the a-amino-f-oxo- butyrate that is the product ofthe reaction catalysed by this enzyme is thereafter utilized via one of two pathways. In some bacteria, including some pseudomonads (Higgins, Pickard & Turner, 1968; Lessie, 1969), aminoacetone is produced by spon- taneous decarboxylation of the oc-amino-fl-oxo- butyrate and is further metabolized, probably via methylglyoxal, to yield pyruvate In Arthrobacter sp.
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J. G. Morris (1969) studied this question.