Metabolic map about cytokines and the inflammatory response

Famous quote (18)

Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men.
(Martin Luther King, Jr.)

Tautomers

Tautomers are a particular class of isomers, which belong to the constitutional isomers. They are molecules characterized by differ among themselves usually in the position of a hydrogen atom. Thus, reactions involving the transfer of a H + to another position in the same molecule (i.e., intramolecular transfer of a proton), are tautomerization reactions.

The tautomers have a high rate of interconversion, and due to this fact often both tautomeric forms are "ignored" and they are considered as the same molecule.
The most common situation is called keto-enol tautomerism. But what does this mean? When we say "keto", we are referring to a molecule which has a carbonyl group, whilst when we say "enol", it is a molecule having one hydroxyl group and the carbon which has this group is simultaneously involved in a double bond. Hence the name enol (en = double bond; ol = hydroxyl group). Normally the form "keto" is the most favored, but in certain (bio)chemical contexts, it may originate the enol form.

In Biochemistry, tautomers have an important role in the metabolism of nitrogen bases, in particular in the pairing between nitrogen bases which occurs in DNA and mainly in RNA.

 

Music about biochemistry

This song has, in my opinion, one of the funniest lyrics made by dr. Ahern (www.davincipress.com/metabmelodies.html). :)
It was based on the music Thank God I'm a Country Boy.

Thank God There's a Video

Students sing text in bold

There's a bundle of things a student oughta know
And Ahern's talk isn't really very slow
Learnin' ain't easy / the lectures kinda blow
Thank God there's a video

Well we've gone through the cycles and their enzymes too
Studying the regulation everything is new
I gotta admit that I haven't got a clue
What am I gonna do?

So I got me a note card and bought me a Stryer
Got the enzymes down and the names he requires
I hope that I can muster up a little more desire
Thank God there's a video

Just got up to speed about the NAD
Protons moving through Complex Vee
Electrons dance in the cytochrome C
Gotta hear the MP3

Fatty acid oxidation makes the acetyl-CoA
Inside the inner matrix of the mitochondri-ay
It's very complicated, I guess I gotta say
Thank God there's a video

So I got me a note card and bought me a Stryer
Got the enzymes down and the names he requires
I hope that I can muster up a little more desire
Thank God there's a video

Replication's kind of easy in a simple kind of way
Copyin' the bases in the plasmid DNAs
Gs goes with Cs and Ts go with As
Thanks to polymerase

And the DNA's a template for the RNA
Helices unwinding at T-A-T-A
Termination happens, then the enzyme goes away
Don't forget the poly-A

So I got me a note card and bought me a Stryer
Got the enzymes down and the names he requires
I think that I can muster up a little more desire
Thank God there's a video
.

Famous quote (17)

Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better. (Albert Einstein)

Tattoo about the Galapagos islands

Video about enzymes

Metabolic map about the role of mitochondria in apoptosis