Biochemistry
This is a protein monomer.
What is an amino acid?
Many monomers connected form this level of protein complexity.
What is quintenary structure?
This system is created when the product of a catalytic cascade inhibits an earlier step in the cascade.
What is a negative feed back loop?
These bind together nucleotide bases maintaining the characteristic double helix of DNA.
What are hydrogen bonds?
An isolated system, such as a cell and its environment, will spontaneously increase in disorder.
What is the second law of thermodynamics?
This is a strong bond formed when atoms share electrons.
What is a covalent bond?
The secondary structure of a protein is formed by these two possible protein structures.
What are alpha helices and beta sheets?
Calls use enzymes to reduce this in a chemical reaction.
What is activation energy?
Nucleotides with a base composed of a single ring of four carbon atoms and two nitrogen atoms.
What are pyrimidines?
This metabolic process releases energy when breaking down macromolecules into smaller units. The cell can use this energy to help power energetically unfavorable reactions.
What is catabolism?
Molecules with the same chemical formula, but different structures.
What are isomers?
This amino acid prefers the cis configuration.
What is proline?
A ligand that binds to a different site on an enzyme outside of its activation site will bind to this site.
What is an allosteric site?
These form the sugar-phosphate backbone by binding together the 5' carbon of one sugar with the 3' carbon of another.
What are phosphodiester bonds?
Amino acids are added to the polypeptide chain in this position, with the exception of proline.
What is trans configuration?
Amino acids are connected by these bonds.
What are peptide bonds?
A protein that is misshapen into a pathogenic shape.
What is a prion?
The addition of this group onto a protein will mark a protein for destruction.
What is ubiquitin?
The two three-dimensional structures formed by the coiling of two DNA strands around each other.
What are the major and minor grooves?
This level of protein structure involves the interaction of alpha helices and beta pleated sheets, which are often amphiphilic and able to interact with hydrophobic and hydrophilic environments.
What is secondary structure?
A reaction where a water molecule is used and a larger molecule is broken down into two smaller ones.
What is a hydrolysis reaction?
All human proteins have amino acids in this configuration.
What is L-configuration?
This enzyme group catalyzes the addition of a phosphate group. It is important in many cell signaling systems and metabolic cascades.
What is a kinase?
The pentose sugar molecule of DNA that lacks a hydroxyl group at the 2' position in the carbon ring.
What is deoxyribose?
Antibodies have highly conserved regions but due to this region, they are able to bind antigens in a highly specific manner.
What is the variable region?