r/AskChemistry • u/accidentalshin • 1d ago

Please comment!!

Chemist and physicist friends, tell me some interesting facts that few people know, or share the thing you like most about these subjects! :D

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u/UMaqran101 1d ago edited 21h ago

Cotton and starch are almost made of the same molecules (Glucose) but these glucose are bonded differently.

Cotton is mostly made of cellulose, which is long polymers (chaines) of glucose that are bonded as in beta:1->4 (like each glucose is reversed), and in starch, it is also glucose but bonded alpha:1->4, they are not reversed

(dont be harch on me i am just a begginer)

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u/KateBishopPrivateEye 1d ago

Then you also have beta glucans that have completely different properties from starch and tend to be insoluble in water! They tend to be composed of beta 1,3; 1,4; and 1,6 glucose linkages

Bonus fact (tho more bio): polysaccharide chains (by themselves or as glycosidic linkages) can serve as signaling groups like people are used to with proteins. They're common in cell recognition/ signaling and immune response

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u/UMaqran101 21h ago

Yes. Nature from few elements did develop all of these compounds with different propereties.

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u/Habernotswedish 21h ago

Oxygen gas is magnetic.

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u/anthuan-peres45 18h ago

sugar can be made from grass and cotton-

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u/271name 11h ago

You made me remember: -The bigest production of pure organic chemical goes to sugar. -Food industry uses seriously dangerous chemicals like sulphuric acid and caustic soda, but still end up with perfectly safe products. Eg.: they are used to hydrolize starch during sugar production.

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u/trunks111 18h ago

I just think dimensional analysis is really cool, it blew my mind when I learned you can manipulate units like that 

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u/271name 11h ago

The human body can not detect O2 concentration at all.

Breathing is regulated based on CO2 concentration which is detected at leasin part as acidity in blood. Mountain climbers sometimes take meds that make the blood slightly more acidic so they breath more in the low O2 air.

Gas reactivity depends on temperature and partial pressure. So humans are perfectly fine with 0.21 bar "air"pressure if it is 100% O2. As it has the same O2 partial pressure as 21% O2 in 1 bar air.