Collagen :)

Many people may say what is collagen and why would we need to know anything about it, right?  Well it turns out collagen is EXTREMELY important to our bodies.  Collagen forms molecular cables that build up our tendons and have vast, resilient sheets that support our skin and internal organs.  Collagen is made up of three amino acids called glycine, proline, and hydroxyproline.  

Vitamin C plays a very important part in the formation of collagen.  Vitamin C helps in the addition of oxygen.  If a person doesn't get enough vitamin C in their diet the production of hydroxyproline and stops the making of new collagen.  This could cause scurvy, which is a severe disease.

Polypeptide chains are arranged by having every third amino acid as a glycine, and many of the remaining amino acids are proline or hydroxyproline.  

Osteogenesis Imperfecta is a bone disease and it is also referred to as the "brittle bone disease."  The main symptom of OI is bone fractures.  However, many other symptoms can occur such as: muscle weakness, hearing loss, fatigue, joint laxity, and scoliosis.  There are eight types of Osteogenesis Imperfecta.  Type I OI is the least severe and most common form of the disorder.  OI Type I is the differs from the other types of OI because the collagen structure remains normal.  OI Type II is the most severe form.  

The role of collagen in bones is very important because your collagen levels predict the strength of your bones.  Collagen problems often lead to bone problems because if you have an insufficient level of collagen, your bones are going to be weak and have "brittle bones", which means they break and fracture easily.

Overall, I learned that collagen is very important to know about and it is crucial to our bodies.  If we don't have sufficient levels of collagen we will have weak bones!!! :)

Untangling the Twisted Proteins that turn Brains into Sponge-Research Article

Just recently, there was a study about what causes mad cow disease and Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease which are fatal brain disorders.  These diseases are not caused by viruses or bacterium.  Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease and mad cow disease are caused by an abnormal formation of a protein called a prion.  Scientists and other studies are beginning to reveal that the prions help natural functions perform before they turn to the "dark side."  Jiyan Ma, a molecular biochemist at OSU, and colleagues transformed a normal protein made by E. coli bacteria into a prion that had the properties of the infectious version.  It starts out by forming clumps, declines being cut by enzymes, and changes other healthy proteins into the aberrant form.  Jiyan Ma and his colleagues injected the prion into the brains of mice, which caused their brains to become spongy and full of holes, initiating telltale signs of prion disease.  Their next step is to take a closer look at the system they used to make infectious prions to identify the molecular mechanisms behind the change.

In another experiment, researches in the U.S. and Austria used a prion protein also made by E. coli to contaminate hamsters with a transmissible brain disease.  The diseases worsened very gradually, similar to how it progresses in humans, referring that hamsters could provide a useful animal model system.

While most research is about the disease-causing prion protein, Adriano Aguzzi of University Hospital of Zurich is looking at the healthy forms of those proteins in humans.  He found that mice who laked those proteins showed a failure of the protective myelin sheath on their nerves.  The main task now is to find out why this protein goes bad at times.

http://discovermagazine.com/2010/jun/04-untangling-prions-twisted-proteins-brains-into-sponge

Carbohydrates :)

In boring terms, a carbohydrate is an organic compound Cm(H20)n, made of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen. In easier and more understanding terms, carbohydrates are what gives our bodies energy.  In our lab we tested many different things such as honey, all the way to lactose powder.  I learned that when a disaccharide is mixed with Benedict's solution it does not change in color, when a monosaccharide is combined with Benedict's solution it turns an orange color, and when a polysaccharide is mixed with Benedict's solution, the ending result is a dark, thick substance.  Attached is a concept map of other things I have learned throughout the lesson.