24.2.11

Writing With Amino Acids

Most of the letters in the alphabet have been used in the standard abbreviations for the 20 proteinogenic amino acids.  If you add in a few other amino acids and some uncertainties all of the letters are accounted for.  This means you can code words into peptides.  I'll show a few examples below:

STAY
 Each amino acid starts with the nitrogen so in this image you can see there are four amino acids (serine, threonine, alanine, and tyrosine) one for each letter in "Stay."

COSBY
Notice the R in the diagram (just above the last NH) comes from "B" which indicates either asparagine or aspartic acid.  The R indicates where asparagine and aspartic acid are different.

AHLSTROM
SUMMERSTAY
Can you identify the already seen "Stay" portion?
HOMER
So now you can pass notes during chemistry class.