Biochemistry

[ciestar]

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So...any tips on diving into a biochem course? Ive been out of school for a while and i'm a bit nervous... Would studying for this much like ochem II be sufficient? It's a lot of mechanisms, correct? Just needs tips to get back into the swing of things!

Thanks 🙂

 

[Lannister]

It depends on your professor. I only had to know one or two specific mechanisms for biochem.

 

[breezy16]

So...any tips on diving into a biochem course? Ive been out of school for a while and i'm a bit nervous... Would studying for this much like ochem II be sufficient? It's a lot of mechanisms, correct? Just needs tips to get back into the swing of things!

Thanks 🙂

Mechanisms are really good to know to realize why certain things are inhibitors.. but raw memorization is necessary first before application of mechanisms. My biochemistry book, by Voet I believe, was super detailed and rumored to be used in some med curriculums.
So I don't know if studying for it is comparable to Orgo II.. biochem is much more conceptual and multifaceted..ie) affecting x can cause a cascade of yz or wrt based on different environments.
Protein chemistry is similar to orgo ii, but many rules change because of dielectric differences, ph, etc.
Take home: learn some cycles first then see if you can undergo application via mechanism. You'll have to be fairly familar with protein chemistry to truly do this.
I hope this helps.

 

[deleted407021]

The 3D cognition you practiced in ochem will be important as will be the ability to do long mechanistic reactions, mostly in the context of enzyme-substrate interactions. In my experience, there's much less tedium in biochem and I enjoyed it much more. It seemed more applicable to what I want to do.

And -- when in doubt -- hydrogen bonding.

 

[Lucca]

You have to remember the big stuff from Ochem, especially Ochem II like carbonyl chemistry, acid/base trends, thermo and kinetic control, stability, bond strength and electron distribution and aromatic chemistry.

Memorization will be required in two ways: 1. Amino acids are the alphabet of biochemistry; if you do not know them, their chemistry, their structure, their properties then you cannot do biochemistry. 2. Mechanisms. Learn the ones you study in your course by memory. Draw and redraw the steps.

Once you have these two things down, biochemistry is just problem solving. How do I apply what I know about existing systems to predict things about new, foreign systems? How do I study and test the properties of systems I might come upon? At least at my uni the biochem courses are very experiment / reasoning focused.

 

[Cyberdyne 101]

To add, you'll likely do a lot of acid/base problems that require the Henderson–Hasselbalch equation.
http://chemwiki.ucdavis.edu/Physica...s/Buffers/Henderson-Hasselbalch_Approximation

 

[GrapesofRath]

This is incredibly dependent on the professor. For my class I could count on one hand the number of mechanisms we ever actually looked at in our entire semester(none of this stuff was ever on our tests). Instead there was much more of a focus on problem solving, experimental analysis, making predictions based off a certain set of conditions(ie what would happen if you downregulated this enzyme or reduced the production of this product in our body) with the rest being memorization based problems like which of the following enzymes has these characteristics?

You will absolutely have to memorize all your amino acids. And yes, you still have to have some basic understanding of organic chemistry(just how much will depend on professor). Best thing I can say is get a feel for how your professor tests and what they like to emphasize and focus on. In my experience how I studied and learned for biochem was nothing like it was for ochem.

Best thing I can also say is keep up with the material. This isnt the type of class cramming is ideal for.

 

[ciestar]

Ahh, right, the amino acids. Guess it won't hurt to start making flash cards and learning them xD well..except proline.