Amino
Acids on Earth
by
Craig O'Neill
1.
The properties of Leucine are:
-
Aliphatic, hydrophobic, nonpolar
-
No ionizable R group
-
No functional group containing
S or N
-
High occurance in beta sheet
2.
A derivative of Leucine would be: (hint: type leucine derivative in search
engine)
3.
An interesting biological or pharmaceutical role of this leucine derivative
is:
-
During physical activity leucine
is broken down into HMB. Extra HMB taken daily helps to slow muscle
tissue loss for athletes.
4.
On a biosphere on a distant planet outside our solar system, a different
but related amino acid is found:
-
On planet Europa, isoleucine
like leucine is a purely ketogenic amino acid. The people of the
planet consume large of quantities of the amino acid, which makes everyone
have a foul bad breath smell.
