Week 4 HW: Protein Design - I

Part A. Conceptual Questions

Question 1. How many molecules of amino acids do you take with a piece of 500 grams of meat? (on average an amino acid is ~100 Daltons)

Answer

A dalton is a unit of mass used to express the mass of atoms, molecules, and other subatomic particles.

The percentage of protein is

Question 2. Why do humans eat beef but do not become a cow, eat fish but do not become fish?

Answer

This is due to digestion breaking down food such as meat and fish into basic molecules like amino acids, fatty acids, and sugars. The DNA present in Food is therefore broken down and rendered nonfunctional; as such, it is not directly incorporated into our genetic structure.

Question 3. Why are there only 20 natural amino acids?

Answer

Question 5 Where did amino acids come from before enzymes that make them, and before life started

Answer

Amino acids were most likely formed before enzymes and life began through abiotic chemical processes, fuelled by the exposure of simple molecules such as methane, ammonia, hydrogen, water, and carbon dioxide to energy sources.

This was demonstrated by Stanley Miller and Harold Urey’s 1953 experiment, which showed that when gases are subjected to electrical sparks, amino acids such as glycine, aspartic acid, and alanine are formed. Additionally, amino acids have been detected in the Murchison meteorite, which suggests that amino acid precursors were formed through photochemical and catalytic reactions.