h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Just been doing a rather technical literature search (midway through in fact) - but this hit has rather thrown me as my mind is now boggling.

>>Discovery of alcohol dehydrogenase from mushrooms and application to alcoholic beverages
Author(s): Okamura-Matsui, T; Tomoda, T; Fukuda, S, et al.
Source: JOURNAL OF MOLECULAR CATALYSIS B-ENZYMATIC Volume: 23 Issue: 2-6 Pages: 133-144 Published: SEP 1 2003
Times Cited: 0 <<

Blimey, what on earth must that be about?

Not actually motivated enough to read it at this moment but still...

Well thinking about it I can work it out a little. Alcohol dehydrogenase is the enzyme in our livers that begins the metabolic breakdown of alcohol.
I'm still loving the idea of some sort of mushroomy cocktail though...

Yep, its the enzyme that begins the alcohol detoxification (alcohol is most defiantely 'seen' as a 'toxin' by the body/liver)... I believe its the enzyme that some people lack, such people can't 'tollerate' alcohol at all as a result I know... I can't really grasp that as a concept either
I believe also that its an enzyme they sometimes examine in blood to see what level of liver dammage is present, as it won't necessarily appear that much directly in blood, less the liver hepatocytes (cells), are dammaged to the point at which they spill their contents, including enzymes like this into blood...
Dding it to alcoholic drinks though...
Woudln't it mean that it just metabolised the alcohol present in the drink so that there was none/less in it by the time you drunk it just the kinda news we wante dto hear befor ethe drinking... I mean festive season gets under way in urnest...

maybe they've just been trying to get some mushrooms drunk to see what happens?

My mind was wondering more what sort of mushrooms they were looking into

They measure levels of g-GT (gamma glutathione transferase) to assess liver damage don't they?
At least that's what a medical doctor told me in a pub once at least. Ah the irony.

GGT is gamma-glutamyl transpeptidase not wot I said.

Have a bonus mark if you can explain the difference

they're spelled differently.

And ta for the bonus mark

Well that get the 1st bonus mark...

well I'm guessing a transferase is involved in transferring something. And as it is stuff to do with enzymes and processing stuff in the body I'll guess that it moves bits of substance to another and thus (in the context of the alchohol above) changes the property of the original? i.e. neuters it be removing a bit of it?

How far off is that?

As for the transpeptidase. Hmmm. Something to do with shifting peptides around? Peptides being something to do with amino acids and thus dna/rna? So is it involved in the transcription process in shifting stuff around to build amino acids and thus dna/rna chains?

Not bad. Many bonus marks for that.

Peptides are chains of amino acids yes, so a protein is a big peptide.

Glutamyl transferase (or transpeptidase I think the names are interchangeable) will therefore transfer the amino acid glutamate from one peptide to another.
And glutamate has an acid group on its gamma position, hence it's this gamma position where it gets linked.

DNA is not made from peptides. What it is, is code for the amino acid sequence of proteins but it is not itself made from them.

oooh, thanks! Lots of half remembered discussions with you and websites and programmes about this stuff. I'm quite pleased with that, not as far off as I thought I'd be (which was completely wrong!)

Should have known I was wrong on the DNA bit though.

So, why does one want to shift glutamate from one peptide to another?
(and do you have to survey 120 women afterwards to see if it worked?)

Well here I shall direct you to wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gamma-glutamyl_transpeptidase

It's pretty complex and is used for a variety of purposes. probably some of which we don't know about.

"pretty complex"
I feel a phrase about constipated Victorian gentlemen detectives coming on

But ta for t'link, I'll give it a go!

The liver is, when working, of course, involved in many catabolic and anabolic biochemical processes, which togehter summate to the metabolic output of the liver.
Amongst its many functions is the synthesis of new peptides, or proteins, from various sources. Linked to this is the livers role in detoxification as part of which it may be involved in breaking down proteins deemed toxic, or not any more require din the body. Some, or all of the aminio acids released during the breakcdown of such proteins/peptides, can therefor e be used in the construction of new polypeptides/proteins.
The liver is also home to a small fat balding Irish man who takes all the alcohol passing through the body and turns it into urine.

2legs in more comprehensible than wikipedia shocker!

Takes him a while to get jokes though

Joke? where?