Molecules of Life - Biology

Flashcards about molecules of life.

What are the bonding properties of carbon?

Carbon can form four covalent bonds with other atoms, a variety of structures including rings and chains, and polar and nonpolar bonds.

What does 'organic' mean in a biological context?

A compound mostly consisting of carbon and hydrogen.

What is a functional group?

An atom or small molecular group bonded to a carbon in an organic compound that impacts chemical properties and imparts chemical behavior.

What are four different ways to represent the chemical structure of an organic molecule?

Structural formula, simplified carbon ring structures, ball-and-stick models, and space-filling models.

What are monomers?

Small organic molecules used as subunits to build larger molecules (polymers)

What are polymers?

Larger molecules that are chains of monomers

What is metabolism?

Cell activities by which cells acquire and use energy to construct, rearrange, and split organic molecules.

What are enzymes?

Proteins that increase the speed of reactions.

What happens during hydrolysis?

Enzymes remove monomers from polymers.

What happens during condensation (or dehydration)?

Enzymes join one monomer to another.

What are carbohydrates used for?

Structural materials, fuels, and storing and transporting energy with a ratio of 1:2:1 of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen.

What are monosaccharides?

One sugar.

What are oligosaccharides?

A few monosaccharides.

What are examples of disaccharides?

Lactose and sucrose.

What are polysaccharides?

Hundreds or thousands of sugars.

Name three of the most common polysaccharides.

Cellulose, starch, and glycogen

What is chitin?

A polysaccharide similar to cellulose found in the cell walls of fungi and outer skeletons of insects, spiders, and shrimp.

What are lipids?

Fatty, oily, or waxy organic compounds that are hydrophobic.

What are fatty acids made of?

A long hydrophobic hydrocarbon tail with a hydrophilic carboxyl head.

What are saturated fatty acids?

Straight tails with single bonds.

What are unsaturated fatty acids?

Crooked tails with double bonds.

What are fats?

Lipids with one, two, or three fatty acids bound to the same glycerol head.

What do triglycerides have?

Three fatty acid tails; the most abundant and richest energy sources in vertebrates.

What are phospholipids?

Lipids with two hydrophobic hydrocarbon tails bound to a hydrophilic phosphate-containing head.

What are waxes?

Complex mixtures with long fatty-acid tails bonded to long-chain alcohols or carbon rings that provide a protective, water-repellant covering.

What are steroids?

Lipids with a rigid backbone of four carbon rings and no fatty-acid tails.

What is cholesterol?

Most important steroid in animal tissue and a component of eukaryotic cell membranes that can be remodeled into bile salts, vitamin D, and steroid hormones.

What is estrogen?

The female sex hormone.

What is testosterone?

The male sex hormone.

What are amino acids?

Small organic molecules with a central carbon bonded with an amine group (—NH3 +), a carboxyl group (—COO− , the acid), and one or more variable groups (R group).

What is the primary structure of a protein?

The unique amino acid sequence of a protein.

What is the secondary structure of a protein?

The polypeptide chain folds and forms hydrogen bonds between amino acids, forming a helix or a sheet.

What is the tertiary structure of a protein?

A secondary structure compacted into structurally stable units called domains, forming a functional protein.

What is quaternary structure?

When some proteins consist of two or more folded polypeptide chains in close association.

What is a glycoprotein?

A protein with one or more oligosaccharides attached to it.

What is a lipoprotein?

A protein that can bind to lipids.

What are denatured proteins?

Proteins that have lost their correct 3D shape due to heat, changes in pH, salts, and detergents disrupting the hydrogen bonds that maintain a protein’s shape.

What are prions?

Misfolded proteins that cause prion diseases.

What are nucleotides?

Function as energy carriers, enzyme helpers, chemical messengers, and subunits of DNA and RNA; composed of ribose bonded to a nitrogen-containing base and one, two, or three phosphate groups.

What are nucleic acids?

Polymers of nucleotides in which the sugar of one nucleotide is attached to the phosphate group of the next.

What is RNA (ribonucleic acid)?

Contains four kinds of nucleotide monomers, including ATP, and is important in protein synthesis.

What is DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid)?

Two chains of nucleotides twisted together into a double helix and held by hydrogen bonds that contain all inherited information necessary to build an organism, coded in the order of nucleotide bases.