Introduction
Investigations into intermediary carbohydrate metabolism in schizophrenic subjects have demonstrated a failure in the regulation of biologic energy production.1-3 The schizophrenic population, when compared with control subjects, manifested an inability to mobilize adenosine triphosphate (ATP) as an adaptive response to insulin stress. Also, under insulin stress, there is a failure to increase production of a key substance, fructose 1-6 diphosphate (F1-6P). By utilizing radioactive glucose labeled at the 1 carbon and the 6 carbon, it was found that the insulin stress decreased the rate of incorporation of the 1 carbon of glucose into CO2 by blood from control subjects, but such a drop did not occur with blood from schizophrenic patients. This effect was found to be related to plasma rather than the erythrocytes of the schizophrenic subjects, and in subsequent experiments chicken erythrocytes were used instead of human cells.4 This eliminated the