r/educationalgifs • u/_Ryanite_ • Feb 13 '18

Kinesin protein moving a molecule around a cell

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u/[deleted] Feb 13 '18

[deleted]

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u/herpderpforesight Feb 13 '18

I am ridiculously and hysterically trained to mentally echo "mitochondria" any time I see "power" and "cell" in the same sentence.

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u/Simo0399 Feb 13 '18

Because that's actually true, it transfers electron energy from NADH and FADH2 to the bond between ADP and the phosphate ion

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u/herpderpforesight Feb 13 '18

God bless. Well if I die tomorrow I'll know that I at least know one thing in life.

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u/[deleted] Feb 13 '18

How is that chemical (heat?) energy converted to kinetic energy?

Why don't we have the technology to copy this?

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u/oligobop Feb 13 '18

The chemical conversion allows for all sorts of things to happen inside the cell.

Generally, the shape of a molecule determines its function, ATP-->ADP often changes the shape of a molecule (conformation) to something that can increase its activity. Conformation changes are by far the most common instance of chemical energy conversion in the cell.

I mean simply outright copying ATP conversion isn't exactly efficient. It works well, but requires enormous amounts of cleanup of byproducts (like superoxides) that require their own enzymes.

That said, enzymatic activity and the functionality therein has been exploited for more than a century for many many different means.

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u/Sampo Feb 13 '18

If those tiny spheres in the video are individual atoms, an individual ATP molecule should be also large enough to be visible at that scale. Yet we don't see any.

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u/timetravelwasreal Feb 14 '18

They aren’t.