Biology › Section B · Biological macromolecules › Topic B.4
Proteins
Proteins are the workhorses of the cell - enzymes, hormones, armor, motors - and every one of them is a chain of just twenty amino acids, folded into a shape that is the function. Change one link and the whole machine can fail: sickle cell anemia is one typo out of nearly six hundred amino acids.
In this topic
- The most versatile macromolecule
- Amino acids: twenty letters
- Peptide bonds and polypeptides
- Primary structure: the sequence
- Worked example: sickle cell, one letter at a time
- Secondary structure: helices and sheets
- Tertiary structure: the full fold
- Quaternary structure: teams of chains
- Denaturation: losing the shape
- Worked example: proteins as an evolutionary clock
- Common mistakes to avoid
- Key takeaways
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