Biotechnology, Vitamins, Carbohydrates, Proteins, Lipids, Nucleic Acid

Branches of life sciences

Biotechnology

• Biotechnologyis the use of living systems and organisms to develop or make useful products
• Can also be defined as “any technological application that uses biological systems, living organisms or derivatives thereof, to make or modify products or processes for specific use”

Bioinformatics

• An interdisciplinary field which addresses biological problems using computational techniques, and makes the rapid organization as well as analysis of biological data possible
• May also be referred to as computational biology, and can be defined as, “conceptualizing biology in terms of molecules and then applying informatics techniques to understand and organize the information associated with these molecules, on a large scale

Nanotechnology

• Nanotechnology(“nanotech”) is the manipulation of matter on an atomic, molecular, and supramolecular scale
• Nanotechnology is the engineering of functional systems at the molecular scale
• Application of nanotechnology includes majorly –

• Inexpensive, efficient solar energy systems, a renewable, zero-carbon emission source
• Desktop computers with a billion processors
• Medical devices able to destroy viruses and cancer cells without damaging healthy cells
• Materials 100 times stronger than steel
• Superior military systems
• More molecular manufacturing systems

Vitamin, Their Chemical Names & Deficiency Diseases

• Vitamin C     → Helps to heal wound & in immunity to the body; Artificially synthesized
• Vitamin B12 → Contains Cobalt
• Vitamin B2   → Gives yellow color to milk
• Vitamin A     → Anti-infective vitamin
• Vitamin K     → Helps in Blood clot

Carbohydrates

• Carbohydrates are the polyhydroxy organic compounds made up of carbon, hydrogen and oxygen in which the ratio of hydrogen and oxygen hydrogen is 2:1 exactly as H2O (2:1)
• Carbohydrates may be classified into the following four major groups viz.

Monosaccharides

• Monosaccharides are the simplest form of carbohydrates.
• All carbohydrates are reduced to this state before absorption and utilization.

Disaccharide

• Disaccharides consist of two covalently joined monosaccharide
• They produce two molecules of the same or different monosaccharides on hydrolysis
• Examples include lactose, sucrose, maltose

Oligosaccaharides

• Oligosaccaharides consist of few number (2-6) of monosaccharide units e.g., glycoproteins.

Polysaccharides

• Polysaccharides are composed of many molecules of monosaccharides linked together e.g., Glycerole

Proteins

• Are macromolecules or bio molecules composed of amino acids linked by peptide bondg. hemoglobin, albumin, globulin, enzymes etc.
• The constituent elements of proteins are carbon (54%), hydrogen (7%), nitrogen (16%), oxygen (22%) and some may contain sulfur (1%) or phosphorus (0.6%)

• Proteins acts as enzymes – accelerate the rate of metabolic reactions
• Perform hereditary transmission by nucleoproteins of the cell nucleus.
• Maintain colloidal osmotic pressure of blood
• As hormones, growth factors – perform regulatory functions and gene activators.

Lipids

• Group of naturally occurring molecules that include fats, waxes, sterols, fat-soluble vitamins (vitamins A, D, E, and k),  monoglycerides, diglycerides, triglycerides, Phospholipids and others

• Main biological functions of lipids include storing energy, signaling, and acting as structural components of cell membranes
• Lipids are hydrophobic and insoluble in water because they contain a hydrocarbon tail of CH₂s that is nonpolar and repellant to water.

Nucleic acid

• Nucleic acids, which include DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) and RNA (ribonucleic acid), are made from monomers known as nucleotides
• Each nucleotide has three components: a 5-carbon sugar, a phosphate group, and a nitrogenous base

• If the sugar is deoxyribose, the polymer is DNA. If the sugar is ribose, the polymer is RNA.
• When a cell divides, its DNA is copied and passed from one cell generation to the next generation.
• DNA is organized into chromosomesand found within the nucleus of our cells.
• RNA is essential to the synthesis of proteins. It is also a component of cell organelles called
• Information contained within the genetic code is typically passed from DNA to RNA to the resulting proteins.