Talk:Biosynthesis

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Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 07:52, 14 May 2019 (UTC)

The deletion discussion is closed Lcporschen (talk) 09:33, 1 May 2026 (UTC)

Serotonin

Can someone add something about the biosysthesis of Serotonin? Lcporschen (talk) 13:24, 1 May 2026 (UTC)

Scope of Biosynthesis: Anabolism or Both Anabolism and Catabolism

Background

In 2024, various page flags and (unsourced) claims were added to this page by an IP address user. I’m adding this topic (in May 2026) to discuss this. The main concern raised appears to be the question of whether biosynthesis refers to just anabolism or both anabolism and catabolism.

Note: let’s please keep this polite. I feel that edit description got a bit close to the line of being a personal attack, so I feel we should try to avoid that kind of thing.

Discussion

I’d like to start by emphasizing that there might not be a “right” answer. Different words can be used differently by different authors and in different contexts. If there is ambiguity, we can choose a suitable meaning, then clarify which meaning we’re using via a hatnote and/or the lede.

From what I can find, it appears that many sources do use biosynthesis to mean primarily anabolism (eg: https://bio.libretexts.org/Bookshelves/Microbiology/Microbiology_(Boundless)/05%3A_Microbial_Metabolism/5.12%3A_Biosynthesis/5.12B%3A_Biosynthesis_and_Energy or https://www.biologyonline.com/dictionary/biosynthesis). Therefore, my opinion is that it’s fine to leave this article to be primarily about anabolism. If there’s a good example of a source that uses it to mean either anabolism or catabolism, we can include a sentence in the lede that mentions that some authors use that larger scope.

Since the distinctions are somewhat artificial, I feel like ambiguity is inevitable. That’s fine in my opinion. In my opinion, this article should just focus on the type of pathways that most people refer to as “biosynthesis,” and not worry about trying to find a perfect natural definition Pabnau (talk) 21:38, 26 May 2026 (UTC)