imagine.

yay update!! my bro just psychoed me again this morning. Well, actually I was the one who asked for it XD I asked him to teach me more about DNA and somehow we got to talk about enzymes. So... here goes. Take a deep breath....:

Firstly, you know quite a lot of enzymes end with 'ase' at the back right? Yep. He said most of the time such enzymes are those that carry out a process called hydrolysis. I asked what is hydrolysis, so he told me to just heck care and rmb that it is the cutting of 'something' with water. And of course when you cut something you need an instrument right. So enzymes are the instruments which are used to carry out hydrolysis. An example: amyl-ase. See the 'ase' at the back? It is the hydrolase (or in other words the class of enzymes that carry out hydrolysis). The word in front is the short form of a name of a chemical. As such, ase is the 'instrument', while the name of the chemical in front is the 'something' on which hydrolysis is carried out on. SO. what does amylase do? It is an enzyme that carries out hydrolysis on the chemical amyl. Amyl is just the short form of a long chemical, but he told me if you know what amyl is, it is already pro enough. Well then. Muha.
Another part of it is: Not all enzymes have chemical-like names at the front. For instance, stuff like 'transferase' or 'polymerase'. They are english words that exist in the Oxford dictionary. So the enzyme simply carries out that process that is named. Another cheam one is 'oxireductase'. So yea, it simply means that the enzyme catalyzes the tranfer of one electron from one chemical to the other. Haha. I am starting to get confused le. Ummmm. Ok so such enzymes with english names at the front are not within the class of enzymes called hydrolases. He said that I need not know anything beyond hydrolases for now because I wouldn't even be using such knowledge in secondary school. Well I guess it's a nice way to say that I am a noob. XD Haha. I love this man. Then he taught me stuff like CCK, a hormone that causes you to lose appetite, makes your oesophagus move food down faster, makes your stomach digest food slower, makes your small intestine absorb food faster and make your large intestinal+rectum shit faster. HAHA. All for one simple goal: to clear your digestive system of any particle, except the stomach which can serve as a reservoir to store stuff. Wow this is sick. he says it's gonna be tested in NUS for his medical test this coming friday and some of his mates still dun understand it. lol... Ok. enough enough. I think most of you would have stopped reading. big bro's coming back on monday. man i am gonna have a hell of a time digesting all this... haix and a friend's going to shanghai le... good luck!! you know who i am talking about.

11:21 AM