Rap music about Biochemistry

Song "The Science Love Song"

Dedicated to those who think that science cannot be romantic... :)

Thank you for the input Suely! :)

Music about the immune system

The music Yankee Doodle inspired Dr. Ahern to create a song about the immune system.

Download the music here

The Immune Tune

Antigen presenting cells
Help to clear infection
And they help your thymocytes
Go through t-cell selection

Endocytose antigen
And then cross-present it
All to slow the illness down
Or possibly prevent it

Activate a CD8
This will help you be well
It will differentiate
To cytotoxic t-cell

Systems of immunity
Fusing with perfection
Thank Adaptive and Innate
For giving such protection!

Music about fatty acid oxidation

Dr. Ahern adapted the song When Johnny Comes Marching Home, turning it a song about the oxidation of fatty acids.

Download the music here

When Acids Get Oxidized

The fatty acids carried by
CoA, CoA
Are oxidized inside the
mi-to-chon-dri-ay
They get to there as you have seen
By hitching rides on carnitine
Then it goes away
When acids get oxidized

Electrons move through membranes, yes
It’s true, it’s true
They jump from complex I onto
Co-Q, Co-Q
The action can be quite intense
When building proton gradients
And its good for you
When acids get oxidized

The protons pass through complex V
You see, you see
They do this to make lots of
A-TP, TP
The mechanism you should know
Goes through the stages L-T-O
So there's energy
When acids get oxidized
.

Rap about cellular respiration

Music about the synthesis of fatty acids

Who could imagine that the song When Johnny Comes Marching Home could be converted in a song about the synthesis of fatty acids? Dr. Ahern, of course! :)

Download the music here

When Acids Are Synthesized

The 16 carbon fatty acid, palmitate
Gets all the carbons that it needs from acetate
Which citric acid helps release
From mitochondri - matrices
Oh a shuttle's great
When acids are synthesized

Carboxylase takes substrate and it puts within
Dioxy carbon carried on a biotin
CoA's all gain a quick release
Replaced by larger ACPs
And it all begins
When acids are synthesized

A malonate contributes to the growing chain
Two carbons seven times around again, again
For saturated acyl-ates
There's lots of N-A-DPH
That you must obtain
When acids are synthesized

Palmitic acid made this way all gets released
Desaturases act to make omega-threes
The finished products big and small
Form esters with a glycerol
So you get obese
When acids are synthesized
.

Beta-oxidation rap

Song about vegetarians

Dr. Ahern got inspiration in the music Blowin' in the Wind of Elton John, to create a short song about vegetarians.

Download the song here

The Vegetarian's Song

How many hot dogs did you eat today?
With all of those nitrites inside?
And those heterocyclic amines in your steak
Were not something you should have tried

There's cancer my friend
Inside your bottom end
There's cancer inside your bottom end

Music about metabolic energy

The Beatles, with its famous song Let it Be, inspired Dr. Ahern to make a music about metabolic energy... :)

Download the music here

En-er-gy

Instructor sings
When I was walking through the forest
Grizzly bears came after me
So I was badly needing
En-er-gy

My body dumped some epinephrine
Out into the blood for me
'Cause I was badly needing
En-er-gy

Everyone sings
En-er-gy / En-er-gy
En-er-gy / En-er-gy
I was badly needing
En-er-gy

Instructor sings
The epinephrine gave a kick to
Enzymes deep inside of me
To make a bunch of cyclic
AMP

And when this hit my protein kinase
Catalytic ecstasy
The C subunits started
Adding P's

Everyone sings
Adding P's, adding P's
Adding P's, adding P's
Phosphorylation city
Adding P's

Instructor sings
The protein kinase put a phosphate
Onto PBK for me
Using energy from
ATP

And PBK in turn provided
GPa from GPb
So I released a ton of
G1P

Everyone sings
G1P / energy
G1P / energy
California needs some
G1P

Instructor sings
And when the chaos had subsided
I consumed some Frito Lays
Which soon began reversing
These pathways

The glucose halted epinephrine
Insulin began the race to
Turn on Phosphoprotein
Phosphatase

Everyone sings
Phosphatase - cleaves the P's
Phosphatase - cleaves the P's
The dephosphorylation
Cleaves the P's

Music about the study of biochemistry (3)

What do you think about the idea to listen Frank Sinatra singing about biochemistry? Well, it is not the real Frank Sinatra that sings, but Dr. Ahern has adapted the famous song My Way and made another music about the study of biochemistry. It is for sure one of my favourite songs of Dr. Ahern! :)

Download the music here

My 'A'

And now, the course is done
Except for all that final testing
Dear friends, let’s have some fun
There surely won’t be much protesting

We’ve had a busy term
Addressing all the content swiftly
And so I sit and squirm
B-B three fif-ty

Exams, there’s been a few
Our averages were somewhat lower
The grades are all askew
I wish that Ahern would go slower

I studied hard each time
And even though my grades were iffy
Oh no, I did not whine
B-B three fif-ty

Yes it was tough
You knew it too
I memorized
My knowledge grew
And through it all
I did not frown
I thought it up
And wrote it down
I fought the fight
I hope it’s right
B-B three fif-ty

I laughed, I cried, I swore
Just as I did here on the first day
But since, the term is o’er
Let’s all go out for thirsty Thursday

I guess I have to face
The fact that I am not a swifty
But oh, I need to ace
B-B three fif-ty

The end arrives
Our grades are out
As I log in
To my account
I say some things
I truly feel
I hope I don’t
Have to appeal
There’s no dismay
I made my ‘A’

B-B three fif-ty
.

Music about to study biochemistry (2)

The "despair" and "anguish" of having to study biochemistry, with all those complicated names, and concepts that are not always very easy to understand, inspired once again Dr. Ahern, who this time was based on the song She’ll Be Comin’ ‘Round the Mountain.

Download the music here

Anthem for BB 350

Oh the students taking BB 350 - 350
Have an awful lot of things that we must know - 350
With acetic acid buffer
Kevin Ahern makes us suffer
The exams could not be tougher 3-5-0 – 350

There’s amino acid side chains to recall - 350
And the things it takes to make cholesterol - 350
Anabolic catabolic
Kevin Ahern’s diabolic
I’m becoming alcoholic 3-5-0 -350

There must be a way to jam into my head - 350
All the metabolic enzyme names I dread - 350
Can you help me learn the spaces
Where the endonucleases
Cut the DNA in places 3-5-0 -350

I must find a way to make a better grade
Or my GPA will truly get waylaid
I shall overcome frustration
To achieve my aspiration
On the last examination 3-5-0, 350

Here’s the plan I made to help me to succeed
Fill the notecard with the knowledge I will need
I’ve put all of Ahern’s quotes
Along with what each one denotes
Onto a massive stack of notes for 3-5-0, 350

So there’s just one teensy problem I must fix
It requires some very skillful penman tricks
Squeezing info I must store
Onto the card he gave before
Will mean a font the size of zero point one four

Music about to study biochemistry

As it seems obvious, Dr. Ahern made a music about the exams of Biochemistry, and about the hard work that is to study for them. He got inspiration in the song The Yellow Rose of Texas. And by the way... for all that are at this moment studying Biochemistry... Good luck! ;)

Download the music here

The Mellow Woes of Testing

The term is almost at an end
Ten weeks since it began
I worried how my grade was ‘cause
I did not have a plan
The first exam went not so well
I got a fifty three
‘Twas just about the average score
In Biochemistry

I buckled down the second time
Did not sow my wild oats
I downloaded the videos
And took a ton of notes
I learned about free energy
And Delta Gee Naught Prime
My score increased by seven points
A C-plus grade was mine

I sang the songs, I memorized
I played the mp3s
I learned the citrate cycle
And I counted ATPs
I had electron transport down
And all of complex vee
I gasped when I saw my exam
It was a ninety three

So heading to the final stretch
I crammed my memory
And came to class on sunny days
For quizzing comedy
I packed a card with info and
My brain almost burned out
‘Twas much to my delight I
Got the ‘A’ I’d dreamed about

So here’s the moral of the song
It doesn’t pay to stew
If scores are not quite what you want
And you don’t have a clue
The answers get into your head
When you know what to do
Watch videos, read highlights and
Review, review, review
.

Music about hormones (epinephrine)

Simon and Garfunkel have immortalized many songs, among which is the famous "The sound of silence". Dr. Ahern adapted this beautiful music and created a song about the hormone apinephrine. You can download it in www.davincipress.com/metabmelodies.html.

 
The Tao of Hormones

Biochemistry my friend
It's time to study you again
Mechanisms that I need to know
Are the things that really stress me so
"Get these pathways planted firmly in your head,"
Ahern said
Let's start with ep-inephrine

Membrane proteins are well known
Changed on binding this hormone
Rearranging selves without protest
Stimulating a G alpha S
To go open up and displace its GDP
With GTP
Because of ep-inephrine

Active G then moves a ways
Stimulating ad cyclase
So a bunch of cyclic AMP
Binds to kinase and then sets it free
All the active sites of the kinases await
Triphosphate
Because of ep-inephrine

Muscles are affected then
Breaking down their glycogen
So they get a wad of energy
In the form of lots of G-1-P
And the synthases that could make a glucose chain
All refrain
Because of ep-inephrine

Now I've reached the pathway end
Going from adrenalin
Here's a trick I learned to get it right
Linking memory to flight or fright
So the mechanism that's the source of anxious fears
Reappears
When I make ep-inephrine

Video with a rap about glycolysis

Music about glycolysis

This song of Dr. Ahern is about glycolysis. It was made from the music God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen and is a very funny way to know the 10 steps of glycolysis! :)

Download the music here

Test Gently on Glycolysis

In glycolysis, a glucose ring's first turned to G6P
The enzyme hexokinase adds a phosphate – PO3
The glucose then turns fructose – 6 carbons, called F6P
Phosphoglu-cose i-som-er-ase, you see
Makes F6P
Phosphoglu-cose i-som-er-ase, you see

Fructose-1,6-bisphosphate, also known as FBP
By phosphofructokinase has a second PO3
By aldolase, it's cleaved in 2, one half gives GAP
Glyceraldehyde-3-phosphate: GAP
It goes on, you see
Through glycolysis, this lucky GAP

The second half, DHAP, can’t carry on this way
You need to change this dihydroxyacetone phosphate
To GAP, so call in "TIM", he’ll make things go his way
Triose phosphate isomerase – the same
TIM is his name TPI and TIM, they are the same

Glyceraldehyde-3-phosphate de-hy-dro-ge-nase is next
1,3-biphosphoglycerate is made; it is the best
A reaction of high energy – it says so in my text
GAPs go to 1,3-BPG
Add PO3
GAPs go to 1,3-BPG

The PO3's then lost, 'cuz phosphoglycerate kinase
By using ADP, it makes 3-phosphogly-cer-ate
This turns to 2PG with phosphoglycerate mutase
Losing water when it meets enolase
E-no-lase
Losing water when it meets enolase
Too many steps, I’m kinda lost, so let me get this straight –
A phosphate and an OH group switch places in step eight
Hence "mutase", 'cuz it changed, but what the heck is
enolase?
It makes phos-pho-enolpyruvate
Isn’t it great?
It makes phos-pho-enolpyruvate

In the 10th and final step (Hooray!) we make our pyruvate
Pyruvate kinase is our friend, he takes us all the way
The phosphate and the double bond – please take them both
away
Leaving only our precious pyruvate
Py-ru-vate
Glycolysis is done, oh happy day!
.

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
.

Music about E. coli

I usually say, in a funny way, that Escherichia coli is one of the biochemists best friends, due to its widely used in the investigation labs. Dr. Ahern (www.davincipress.com/metabmelodies.html) has decided to dedicate it a song, based on the Christmas music Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.

The E. coli Song

Instructor sings
E. coli's very simple
That's the way the story goes
But if you worked around it
You would probably hold your nose

Most of the other cell types
Have a mitochondrion
They use to make triphosphates
By phos-phor-y-la-she-un

Everyone sings
When there is no oxygen
Coli's got it made
Glucose breakdown products all
Wind up making ethanol

Instructor sings
Then all the cells around it
Shout E. coli's name with glee
“You make us feel light-headed”
“When you act fermentally”
.

Music about biochemistry

This song made by Dr. Ahern (www.davincipress.com/metabmelodies.html) is one of those that everyone likes. It is based on the music If You're Happy and You Know It, Clap Your Hands, and it covers several issues of biochemistry. Come on, everybody singing...:)

If You're Molecular and Know It, Clap Your Hands

Instructor sings regular text, class sings bold text

If you want to have a lot of energy (En-er-gy)
You had better make a lot of ATP (A-T-P)
I will only tell you once
You need proton gradients
And a bunch of starting stuff like ADP (A-D-P)

If you hanker for a sweet thing you can taste (You can taste)
And your Atkins diet book has been misplaced (been misplaced)
You should know adrenalin
Is an aid to getting thin
Putting phosphates onto enzymes trims your waist (trims your waist)

If you're feeling kind of achy in your ways (in your ways)
And that hangover has hung around for days ('round for days)
You should know you silly dear
Pain does not come from your beer
Prostaglandin's made by PGH synthase (H synthase)

There are acids in the bile that make up gall (make up gall)
Which emulsify triacylglyerol (glycerol)
If your health is gone to hell
You should blame the LDLs
'Cause they carry all of that cholesterol (lesterol??)

Some phosphates and a sugar on a base (on a base)
Make up C's and G's and U's or T's and A's (T''s and A's)
You can make a DNA
Or a strand of RNA
If you add a template and polymerase (lymerase??)

If you want to ace this test with utmost ease (utmost ease)
You don't really have to get down on your knees (on your knees)
And you need not say a prayer
So please don't pull out your hair
Just go download QuickTimes or the MP3s (MP3s)

Music about PCR

PCR is present in the daily routine of many investigators. Due to Dr. Ahern (www.davincipress.com/metabmelodies.html), it can also be present in the form of a music. This sob was base on the famous She’ll Be Comin’ Around the Mountain.

PCR Woes

First you must design the primers- PCR!
Make sure that they won't form dimers - PCR!
Then you check the melting T's
A's and T's are two degrees
And it's four for G's and C's in PCR!

Oh the thermocycler's set for PCR!
If this fails you'll be upset with PCR!
First you melt and did I mention
It's anneal and then extension
Copying is the intention - PCR!

Many times the protocol you've tried to fix
Checking all your tubes and then your mastermix
Looking for contamination
As you build up your frustration
If there's no amplification - PCR!

You can use reverse transcription - PCR!
Surely you'll throw a conniption - PCR!
Other types may give you trouble
Oh there's inverse and there's bubble
Your anxiety will double - PCR

Oh you've really got to amplify this strand
Hope that when you run your gel you've got a band
Didn't get what you expected
Damn this project you selected
Now you're feeling quite dejected - PCR!

Music about codons

This music was bsed on the famous When I'm Sixty Four, and talks about codons. It was made by Dr. Kevin Ahern (www.davincipress.com/metabmelodies.html).

The Codon Song

Building of proteins, you oughta know
Needs amino A's
Peptide bond catalysis in ribosomes
Triplet bases, three letter codes
Mixing and matching nucleotides
Who is keeping score?
Here is the low down
If you count codons
You'll get sixty four

Got - to - line - up - right
16-S R-N-A and
Shine Dalgarno site

You can make peptides, every size
With the proper code
Start codons positioned
In the P site place
Initiator t-RNAs
UGA stops and AUGs go
Who could ask for more?
You know the low down
Count up the codons
There are sixty four