Phosphorolysis

Phosphorolysis is the cleavage of a compound in which inorganic phosphate is the attacking group. It is analogous to hydrolysis.

An example of this is glycogen breakdown by glycogen phosphorylase, which catalyzes attack by inorganic phosphate on the terminal glycosyl residue at the nonreducing end of a glycogen molecule. If the glycogen chain has n glucose units, the products of a single phosphorolytic event are one molecule of glucose 1-phosphate and a glycogen chain of n-1 remaining glucose units.