Entropy

I find that the best way to separate the glycerol from the biodiesel is to use a sep funnel and give it time due to the equilibrium solubility issue. As you drain off excess glycerol, more of it will come out of the biodiesel, improving the quality.

Hydrogen bonding is a critical component to stable secondary protein structure, although this generally applies to the backbones interacting more so then the functional groups.

The above picture shows that pretty readily.

Polar, positive and negative residues will generally be interacting or not interacting with whatever the protein happens to be in (if in solution/water, they will interact with the water, if in a hydrophobic environment, they will interact with each other). Things like cysteine can often interact with other cysteine amino acids to form di-sulfide bonds.

Another factor is pH. This has a huge effect on the positive and negative residues, and controls what particular state they are in due to their weak acid/base nature. It can shift hydrogen bonding networks and how they interact with water and with each other.

I hope this helps.

Perhaps vaccuum the air out before freezing. I suspect that would do some good. Don't drink from the bottle at all. The air will mess with the wine, though. Keeping things at a cool temperature prevents breakdown.

It would probably be easier to remove oxygen by blowing nitrogen (or even better Argon) over the wine to remove oxygen.

This is the course description of the 300 level genetics course I took as a college student.

300 /500 Genetics

4 crs (4-2). F, Sp.

Not for GE

P: BIOL 211 or 201 or 312 or 316 or consent of

instructor; and MATH 109 with a grade of C or above

Basic principles of heredity and variation; genetic systems, structure and roles of nucleic acids, mutation, allelism, genes in development, genes in populations, and genetics in human life; genetic engineering and genomics.

http://www.gradschools.com is a good website.

Here's a link to your particular major.

http://www.gradschools.com/Subject/Medicinal-Chemistry/257.html

I hope this helps.

My current employer would like me to begin doing science based podcasts. Does anyone else here do podcasts? Any suggestions?

Also, what science based podcasts do you listen to? I'm looking for some ideas before I go about this.

I've wanted to be a scientist for a very long time. In high school, I decided that biochemistry is where I wanted to be. I got my BS in biochem and decided I wanted to go to grad school to get a PhD. I ended up with my MS after 2 years due to major burn out. I'm still interested in getting a PhD and lecturing at a university, but the amount of time it takes and the dedication is huge.

At this point lecturing at a community college is fulfilling, but I can forsee in the future getting bored talking about elementary chemistry. That may push me to going back to grad school.

http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsrchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=3996058.PN.&OS=PN/3996058&RS=PN/3996058

 

This patent suggests that the dichromate reacts with dissolved oxygen, thereby preventing that oxygen from corroding the steel.

I'm not sure how it would do that, since that's pretty much the fully oxidized state of Cr as far as I know (I could be wrong, but I've never seen a more oxidized state then that). Not to mention that the article mentions a mixture of gypsum and wax, which makes me think a coating is more of the idea.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corrosion_inhibitor

 

This one indicates that the dichromate forms a passivation layer on the steel, protecting it. It is probably condition dependent (such as what the pipe is carrying) for which mechanism is dominant.

This seems much more plausible to me.

Biofuels are probably the connecting thread between oil based vehicles and electric vehicles.

There's a large push for ethanol around here, largely because of the corn production.

Honestly, I feel cellulosic ethanol has the most potential, largely because it can be developed out of waste material. Making something out of nothing is generally a winning situation. However, it does require more initial prep before it can be turned into ethanol.

Corn is not as advantageous as sugar cane (which is what Brazil uses primarily) due to it's lower sugar content. We may see a dynamic shift from corn's use as a primarily food crop and develop into a fuel crop. Advances to increase sugar production in the corn at lower cost will have to happen it seems.

Hi I'm Entropy Happens...

 

It really does...

Interesting....

Perhaps a course in biophysical chemistry might be more useful to you. Learning about how proteins fold and function seems to be what you are most interested in. That's a large part of what is covered. It doesn't require as much calculus (generally 1 semester at most) and you end up doing a fair amount of computer modeling.

Physical chemistry can help with how you view the molecules moving. At least that's what it did for me. It also taught me the limits of equipment.

You might find the concepts taught in P-chem to be useful for developing different/better equipment for what you want to study.

Yes, you can use tags, but this does not allow a separation and maybe subsequent identification of all the proteins in crude extract (as indicated in the op).

You can either capture only those that have been tagged genetically (e.g. using Hist-tags) or you would more or less randomly (in many techniques the lysine residue is targeted) label everything. This is normally not the goal if you want to analyse a crude extract.

Kind of missed the whole "proteome" part.

I'm not sure what all the requirements are to get into PA school, but those I do know who have entered it, generally had a BS degree in Biology, Chemistry, Biochem or the like. My understanding is that it was similar to a master's program (took 2 years IIRC).

I would contact schools that you are interested in.

Here's a link to help you track down schools near you so you can check out what there requirements are.

http://www.gradschools.com/Subject/Physician-Assistant/315.html

plz tell me if i want to put a reaction with NHS ester of arginine and glycine..what solvent i hv to used and why??

Are you talking about forming a peptide bond between these 2 amino acids?

Or are you talking about having the side chain from arginine interact with the carboxyl end of the glycine?

Probably Molecular Biology 101, but I was wondering if anyone could tell me how an amino acid's pKa can be altered by protein environments and also by surrounding charge?

 

e.g. Glutatate and aspartate can hold onto protons around the physiological pH in some instances (microenvironment and surrounding charge) when their pKa is much lower - how do they do this!

It has to do with the situation. If hydrogen bonding networks established are unable to be interrupted then the proton will remain attached to the amino acid.

Protein shape can also have an effect. If the shape is such that it shields the side chains from outside effects, then the proton will be unable to leave.

It could also mean that the peptides they were dealing with were amino rich.

For example: they could be made up of predominantly lysine and arginine.

IIRC you can also use "tags" for specific proteins or nucleic acids during purification. There are several different ways to do it, but one common way would be to biotinylate (use of biotin as a tag) your molecule (protein, DNA, etc) of interest and then use avadin to select it from the rest of the cellular "stuff".

Another favored method will use anti-bodies. This is generally done for difficult to isolate or unstable proteins that don't do as well with normal methods of protein purification. It's generally quite expensive and labor intensive.

Microbrewed beer is my downfall.

It's very rare that you won't find a 6 pack of something or other in my fridge (currently Dogfish head 60 min IPA)

Also have a decent selection of single malt scotch.

I don't smoke regularly, known to have a cigar couple of times a year.

Caffeine is my preferred drug of choice.

Food is a little more complicated. I try to limit sweets and fats, but I have good days and bad days like everyone else.

That is still quite a bit of money, something like £70. Most I ever spend on a book for undergrad was £40, ~$70. Even that sounded a lot to me.

They are expensive, unfortunately, I've been completely unable to find books that cover the material appropriately for a better price.

If the books are out of the price range of the students then the content does not matter. I think overall there is some kind of balance that needs to be met here.

The good thing about taking courses in America is the government does provide money for students to take courses. Generally the books to my courses run around $120 and lab manuals run about $130.

Apart from the first year courses, in my experience the lectures make notes from many books and thus attending the lectures and keeping notes is important.

My students do best when they attend lectures and read out of the book. Although, as a student, I generally did very little reading out of the book.

PubMed Central

I agree. This is where I go to first to find quality peer reviewed articles.

Any person teaching a course will be aware of the cost of the books and should not use one that is clearly out of the price range of most of the students.

It is also important to pick a book based on how the material is presented. Picking a book based on cost is a terrible way to approach a subject.

If I pick a book that is above the student's ability to understand, it will be completely worthless to them.

I think profs generally get their copy for free if they adopt it as the course textbook.

Correct. Often professors can get free books if they are interested in adopting it for a course. I've never had to send one back because I've decided not to use it.

Hello, I'm Entropy, and at one time I was a real scientist. My favored field of study is biochemistry (protein kinetics were my specialty) but now I teach chemistry at a relatively small community college.

Second semester calculus based physics. E&M beat me up pretty bad. I'm better at it now, but at the time it was not pretty.

I'll bite.

No offense, but offense.

I think you guys are lame.

 

The worst classes for me were the ones that didn't relate the the major.

Simply anything that wasn't really science, unlike chemistry, physics, biology, and math.

I did enjoy philosophy classes, though.

 

I didn't go to school take a single social science course. Nor do I ever care to think much about the social sciences. I didn't care for the humanities, arts, or being subjected to learning 4 semester of the Spanish language (which I now know very well but hate; and me thinks it an aesthetically unpleasing language unlike nihongo).

 

Going to school to be a liberal artist was not my original intention. My intention was to be a biology major with knowledge of many science topics.

 

I don't care about art or the humanities. I like studying the Japanese language. I like studying computer science. I like studying a variety of the topics I was forced to take before I took them. Hence, I felt like I was mentally raped and my time stolen away because of silly crap, such as psychology, US history, arts of the western world, etc...

 

I understood them well when I came. I've aced just about every course I've taken so far that doesn't relate to my major.

Hence, I already understood the material.

 

Furtherhence, sitting in those classes for 50 minutes at a time was a serious yawn, bore, and should have been against the Geneva convention. Seriously unethical.

 

Yeah, I'm a proponent of technical vocation. I've told my professors how I feel about America and its curriculum. I tell them I think things are archaic and just a way to get money from people. They think I'm a prick. Eh.

Interesting perspective and not at all uncommon. There were times when I was sitting in college (undergrad) and I to loathed my time there. Fortunately, time brings perspective, and those classes are rather useful, as in most cases in the outside world you will deal with non-science people.

Those classes provide insight to other fields and how those perceive the world around them, which is valuable when communicating with them.

The world is larger then just science, and one of the important things about science is being able to communicate it to the rest of the world.

Of course, if you have no interest in communicating with non-scientists, by all means, stay the course.