Cardronym Hydroxyboodle

 Cardronym Hydroxyboodle

Laura Lex tries to learn science with her gallivanting brother Ron

Laura: Foreign.

Laura: Foreign. Hello and welcome to another episode of Lex Education. It's the comedy science podcast where comedian me, Laura Lex, tries to learn science with her gallivanting brother Ron. Hello, I'm Ron. I love being alone and Europe and, uh, Judith. Hi, Ron. How's your week been? I don't know because I'm not here. Ron's not here, everyone. Don't know if you could tell from my, um, impression that wasn't actually Ron, it was me. Anyway, um, Ron is. I think he's in Switzerland. I don't know. I've been too busy to text him really. And I've seen him text me a few times. And you know what? If feels good to be the one who's not needy for attention. He'll never listen to this, so I can say this with gay abandon and I shall. Uh, he's off visiting friends and, and such and malarkey.

How are you all doing on Good Friday? Ron has a headache

So, um, it's left to me to introduce the episode which I haven't listened to because guess what? I've been up to my eyeballs in work, but also, I, uh, just haven't. I'm bringing a real Ron energy to this. What are we even doing today? Functional groups. I think this went okay. I think. Who knows? Anyway, how are you? Are you all alright? Have you got a headache? I've got a headache. It's going because I did have a big glass of water. Do not tell Ron that I drank water of my own volition. I've got into a new pattern now though because I have to take, uh, supplements in the morning to deal with my incredibly low blood iron stuff. Um, apparently it's not good that every time you stand up you lose your vision. So trying to sort that out. And I have to take the old anti D and I think they really ruined my first cup of tea of the day. So I've started taking them with a pint of water before my cup of tea. Just smashing some water into my body first thing in the day. And um, don't tell Ron, but some of my perpetual headache has been vanishing since I started hydrating, so there's that. Um, I've had a very, very busy week. I hope you're having a lovely Easter if you celebrate Easter, or just some time off if you don't celebrate Easter but are forced, ah, to have your rest time within the Christian calendar. Um, that's, that's certainly what I'm doing. We were supposed to go on an Easter egg hunt. It's currently Good Friday where I'm blabbering this Around. We were supposed to go on an Easter egg hunt today, me and Child of the Podcast, Father of the podcast, husband of the podcast, Tom is, uh, away. Um, but then I read the small print and realised I haven't made an Easter bonnet for Child of the Podcast, partly for the time reasons. And secondly, can you imagine anything worse? And not in my skill set either. I'm not like a craft person, particularly, so I've decided not to go. And I think she's young enough that she doesn't know that we're supposed to be doing things like that around this time of year. So we're not going to do that. I think we're going to play Duplo this afternoon and maybe go to the garden centre where Child of the Podcast is in love with one of the staff. Shout out to Rich, hi, mate, she loves you.

The Egg a Thon has landed. You're missing out on so much stuff

Uh, anyway, speaking of Easter and eggs and stuff, the Egg a Thon has landed. What? You're not a patron, so you couldn't watch it. You were missing out. You're missing out on so much stuff. One, you're missing out on the cosy glow of supporting two people who love making a silly thing that clearly you love if you're here and listening. Two, you're missing out on eggs. You're missing out on three Egg a thons. Actually, uh, there's one where I threw up. There's this one where there's actually some violence that I genuinely had to apologise for afterwards. And there's a third one that I can't remember what happens. But you're also missing out on so much extra stuff. And, um, two Crimes and a Lie, for example, featuring younger sister of the podcast and father of the podcast, Agony dad, and all sorts of deep dives into weird and wonderful. So give us a support. As you know, there's no advertising on this podcast. We get no support or financial help from anybody but you. So we rely on you guys to make it even vaguely less of a black hole for us to make. Um, there's that. Right, go forth and listen to the episode now. And, uh, I will be back without Ron afterwards. Oh, I hope this biology is better than last time, though.

Ron: It's still, um. We're still doing molecular biology, but we're off reagents. The word Benedict shall only be said that once.

Laura: Oh, uh, thank God it was so dry, the last one,

00:05:00

Laura: Ron. And when I was editing it and writing the notes, I was like, this. This doesn't even feel like biology.

Ron: But it was. Yeah, yeah, welcome to a level Oh, a level.

Laura: You're letting me down, King.

We're going to learn about what fats are made of, what they do

Ron: So we're moving on to a new, uh, little topic.

Laura: Yeah, yeah.

Ron: 3.1.3 lipids. What's a lipid, Laura?

Laura: It's a fat run.

Ron: Yes, yes indeed. We're going to learn about, um, what fats are made of, what they do and why they are the way that they are.

Laura: Okay, this sounds good.

Ron: Yeah. What about their physical properties? Leads. Leads them to sort of interact with our bodies and whatnot the way that they are. Okay.

Laura: Okay.

We still haven't played our day 15 of overtime. Do you realise though, Ron

Ron: The first thing that, um, we're going to.

Laura: We're just getting straight on with this, aren't we?

Ron: Biology.

Laura: Whoa.

Ron: Plus the last two segments that we just recorded, we had rambling slow intros to both of them.

Laura: We sure did. Oh, uh, younger sister of the podcast and I bought her a new TV this week. I say I was there. I did not contribute to the purchasing. Um, but she, uh, can now play plates and see the screen.

Ron: Laura, how crazy is it that you can replenish your hearts? Have you seen that before? You didn't seem to care.

Laura: Yeah, I'd seen it before.

Ron: Oh, I'd never seen that before. That's crazy beans.

Laura: I just think that the chances of having a heart box and getting that.

Ron: But I had both, so I've got a Phoenix franchise now.

Laura: That's great, Ron.

Ron: I got um, I triple franchise tacos on my own.

Laura: Smart. I had a really sad morning actually. I gave myself 15 minutes to play before we recorded today and a 5 franchise coffee shop died.

Ron: Oof. Yeah, that's tough. I'm now doing breakfast where I just take all, all of the side options to ah, keep lumbers numbers low and then just make these crazy complex plates. But like I'm getting like five tables a day.

Laura: Nice. Do you realise though, Ron, we still haven't played our day 15 of overtime. Yeah, I'm scared now.

Ron: Nah, that, that one's. It's fully automated.

Laura: We need to find a time to do it.

Ron: Yeah, I'm busy at the moment. You're busy at the moment?

Laura: Yeah.

There are two types of lipid molecule that we are going to look at

Okay, back to biology.

Ron: Anyway, so there are two, um, types of lipid molecule that we are going to be looking at. Laura.

Laura: Um, I like the word lipid.

Ron: Lipid. Um, the first one is cupid limpet. The first one is triglycerides.

Laura: Triglyceride glycerides.

Ron: I'm going to put the other one, ah, are phospholipids.

Laura: Phospholipids. That sounds like a track. Phospholipids. Like that would that, would that Would be a Fat Boy Slim track.

Ron: Yeah, Fat Boy Slim's a bit before my time.

Laura: Yeah.

Ron: Part of the 90s raver culture scene. Like you were, uh.

Laura: This is how uncool I was as a teenager though. The. I remember being exceptionally excited to get a CD player because it meant I could skip Fatboy Slim instead of having to fast forward through it because I did not care for was silly music that was just loud noises instead of handsome boys singing in harmony.

Ron: Do you like a bit of frat boy slim now? He's a bit of a Brighton legend.

Laura: Yeah, I do like it a lot more now. I get it. But um, what was that one called? The funk's old brother. What was that called?

Ron: Funk. So weapon of choice. No, that's a different one.

Laura: What's that song called? See, and they don't even name it after the words that they're saying a lot in the chorus. That's stupid.

Ron: I mean they often do.

Laura: I hated that song and I really enjoyed skipping it on my CD player.

Ron: Wow.

I used to get bullied via Fat Boy Slim at my first job

Anyway, so going to focus in on triglycerides now.

Laura: It wasn't called triglycerides now Triglycerides now.

Ron: The funk soul brother for Lipids Rockefeller Skank.

Laura: That was it.

Ron: I used to get bullied via Fat Boy Slim at my first job. Um, cuz he's uh, got a song. Hang on, what's it called? Uh, he's got a song called don't let the man get you down which samples a song by the electric five in the 60s which was about hippie culture. And the line that gets repeated all the time in um, the Fat boy Slim song is. And the sign said that long haired freaky people need not apply. And they just used to play it.

Laura: In the office

00:10:00

Laura: because you had long hair.

Ron: I had long hair? Yeah.

Laura: Your little ponytail man bun.

Ron: Yeah.

Laura: Triglycerides are made up of one glycerol molecule

Anyway, so triglycerides, Laura.

Laura: Triglycerides.

Ron: Yes. Triglycerides are um, made up of one glycerol molecule and three fatty acids attached to it.

Laura: Three fatty acids at the back of the bus.

Ron: Okay. So we're gonna draw glycerol first. Okay. To understand that, uh, it's a common molecule that pops up. So it's worth knowing its makeup. Okay.

Laura: It's uh, gone for a high contour and a little bit of blush, but a peachy blush, not a rose.

Ron: It's three carbon molecules in a chain.

Laura: Okay.

Ron: And then you have a hydroxyl group coming off each of those.

Laura: That's an. Oh, is it?

Ron: Yeah, yeah. Well done.

Laura: Mhm. I'm gonna Draw this out exactly as you've told me, and then I'm gonna show it to you. And then you are gonna inexplicably go, well, no, because you haven't done this, and I'm gonna be baffled as to how it's wrong.

Ron: Ow. I punched my mic down a little. So one hydroxyl group coming off each of them. I did say a hydroxyl group coming off each of them. You filled in all of the gaps.

Laura: That's on me.

Ron: Yeah. Thank you. I didn't think that was on me.

Laura: And then just some spare carbon chains.

Ron: Well, from your knowledge of molecular biology.

Laura: They'Ll make double chains between the carbons.

Ron: Uh, no. What usually fills the gaps?

Laura: More carbon.

Ron: No, because it's a chain of three.

Laura: Oxygen.

Ron: No.

Laura: Hydrogen.

Ron: Yes, hydrogen.

Laura: So then hydrogen's off all the other sticks.

Ron: Hydrogen's off all the other bits. Yeah.

Laura: Okay, from my knowledge, if, uh, I were a baboon, and I am now you're gonna tell me that the hydroxyl group should have gone in a specific place.

Ron: No. I mean, it's odd. I don't know why your brain works like that, but that is fine.

Laura: How is that weird?

Ron: Why? Um, every drink of glycerol. Hang on, let me show you. It's just not how anyone does it.

Laura: I've done them two off the side, off the edge ones, and then the middle one, it's off the bottom.

Ron: Yeah. Bizarre.

Laura: Why is that bizarre?

Ron: It's just.

Laura: Where would you have drawn them?

Ron: Like this. I'm just sending you.

Laura: What.

Ron: All off the same side, obviously.

Laura: Well, this is insane, this drawing. Because they've done their. They've done that portrait. Not landscape. Who's drawing molecules? Portrait.

Ron: Well, because that. Then each of those ohs then connects to a fatty acid. So it's good to have those all trailing off in the same direction.

Laura: Oh, geez. My Mary Beth. Okay, I'm redrawing it for a third time. Oh. O. O. And then. Okay, Right.

Do you think we should do the Agathon before I go to New Zealand

Ron: Okay, so we're gonna, um, do a little bit of fast forwarding now, Laura, to something that we're gonna go through. Yeah. You remember when we were going through this and I sort of said, this all seems jumbly backwards to me?

Laura: Jumble Frog. Do you remember Jumble Frog? Great episode.

Ron: That was first ever special we did.

Laura: Yeah. Do you think we need to do the Agathon before I go to New Zealand?

Ron: When's Easter?

Laura: M. It's before I go to New Zealand.

Ron: So, yeah, I'd say yeah. Yeah, we do, probably. Do you think um, do you think we should, uh, have turkey and um, pigs in blankets before January? Yeah, I do think.

Laura: God. We need to get planning, Ron.

Ron: Yeah. Anyway, listen up.

Laura: Mhm.

We're going to learn about two functional groups in chemistry

Ron: So, um, we're going to do a bit of fast forwarding to something that we're going to go into more detail in chemistry. But, um, it's. There's, there's two things that, um, we're, we're going to cover a bit of as we go through this, just to do a bit of sort of, uh, side by side learning of different things.

00:15:00

Ron: One of them is a concept called periodicity. Okay.

Laura: Okay.

Ron: And the other one is a concept called a functional group. Functional groups we've talked about before at gcse.

Laura: Yeah, that sounds familiar.

Ron: A functional group is just like a pattern of atoms that comes up, uh, multiple times and reacts in a certain way because of the properties of the elements involved and the structure of the molecule. Okay. So we're gonna learn about a couple of those. We're gonna learn about two. We're gonna learn about something called an ester. And we're gonna learn about, um, a carboxyl acid group.

Laura: You can't call one carboxyl acid group and the other one Esther.

Ron: Why not?

Laura: Because that's mad. This is Frank and carjamin. Hydroxybutyl.

Ron: Look, I don't know where the name Esther came from, but the carboxyl acid isn't it? No. But why the. Why is the molecule?

Laura: Why is the world the way it is?

Ron: The word ester was coined in 1848 by German chemist Leopold Gemelin, probably as a contraction of the German essegaether, ascetic, ethereum. None the wiser, to be honest.

Laura: Right. Ester and what?

Ron: And a carboxyl acid.

Laura: Carboxyl acid.

Ron: Okay. Um, can you get up a periodic table while we're chatting through this, Lauren?

Laura: I'll get my old notebook. It's here. It's still here with all this cash, huh? Money.

Ron: Yeah. Bye.

Laura: I got my periodic table.

In chemistry, we're talking about how electrons move in atoms

Ron: Okay, so we're. We're in, in chemistry, we're talking about how. We're talking about the, the electrons whizzing around, um, the, the outside of the atom. Yeah. And how, why are the electrons kept there? What. What are the forces in play there?

Laura: Catch and pull, to and fro. That's what makes the atoms go. It's charge.

Ron: Yeah. Charge. Yeah. Specifically what charges?

Laura: Positive and negative charges.

Ron: Absolutely. Yeah. Positively charged nucleus.

Laura: Magnets.

Ron: Sort of positively HM charged nucleus. Negatively charged electrons. Okay.

Laura: Yes.

Ron: What do you think would happen if. And let's just imagine it with magnets. If you had a bigger, uh, magnet in the middle, the.

Laura: Electrons would move further away. No. What, come closer together?

Ron: Yeah, yeah, yeah. So as we, um, as we go.

Laura: Across, is first instinct always wrong?

Ron: Sorry. Don't ask if you don't want to hear the truth. Um, so if you look at your periodic table.

Laura: Yep.

Ron: Um, we're learning about how we've got the different shells of electrons and each row and a crosser represents one of these shells. Yeah, yeah. As we go from left to right on the periodic table, what's happening to the nucleuses of those elements?

Laura: They're getting more full of things.

Ron: What things?

Laura: Neutrons and um, protons.

Ron: So essentially that magnetic pull of the nucleus is getting bigger as we go.

Laura: Across, so the shells get denser.

Ron: So because the outer shell for. And the two, uh, atoms that we really have to know about in this case would be carbon and oxygen. Because oxygen has more protons in its nucleus and the outer shell is the same. Is starting at the same distance away as carbon. What

00:20:00

Ron: oxygen does is oxygen pulls those electrons closer to itself. Okay.

Laura: Yeah.

Ron: This has a couple of different effects. It makes oxygen more reactive than, than carbon because we know that chemical reactions. You have to stop bringing Mackie up with you. You get too distracted.

Laura: There's an alert. She sneezed.

Ron: Yeah. Not for biology. When we've actually got content.

Laura: I didn't know that there would be content. Did you hear the last biology lesson?

Ron: Biological why? I am on biology. So we know that chemical reactions are, uh, about the, the swapping and the moving of electrons, right?

Laura: Yeah.

Ron: So oxygen more reactive than carbon because not only does it have more protons, so it's attracting things in more, but also the distance between the outer shell, which is effectively where a bond is going to be, and the oxygen is then also shorter. So it's much stronger pull, right?

Laura: Mhm.

Ron: Cool. How does this.

Laura: How did I write that down?

Ron: Okay, so.

Laura: Right.

Ron: The concepts.

Laura: Hang on. Can I do some thinking?

Ron: Sorry, you asked to me.

Laura: I asked to me. Sorry. Um, sorry, Ron. I understand that was a failure in communication on my part.

Ron: Um.

Laura: Oh my God, Ron in Real Housewives right now, one of the.

Ron: Afterwards. Afterwards.

Laura: And her partner that nobody likes, they're pretending he's got cancer for sympathy.

Ron: Wow.

Laura: It's possibly one of the most harrowing things I've ever had to watch. Um, okay, you got. As the nucleus grows in content. Mm. We're talking protons mainly. Um, the positive pull gets stronger. Uh, okay, Laura, that's uh, sounding Great. So the shells of electrons are pulled closer, giving more hold, hold and charge to potential bonds.

Laura: Periodicity. Why it's called periodicity is because, um,

Such as Andrew Garfield. Or is it going to be Henry Cavill? Have, um, they announced who Bond's going to be yet?

Ron: No.

Laura: M still could be us, Ron.

Ron: I could do an okay Bond, I think.

Laura: No, you are too chill. I think Bond has like an underlying hypertension that I can't see you doing.

Ron: That's fair.

Laura: Uh, anyway, in the second film you would say, I, uh, can't run and save that person. Last time I ran to pill, I bruised my feet. And then you would not do it a second time.

Ron: Right. Okay. What's this concept that we're talking about called, Laura?

Laura: Functional groups.

Ron: Periodicity.

Laura: Periodicity. Never go with your gut, Laura. Uh, your gut is thick, but your brain is smart. That's periodicity. Uh, and that's Esther.

Ron: No, it's periodicity.

Laura: What was Esther about?

Ron: Esther is a functional group. Same as a car box. A hydroxyl group is a functional group. Right, okay, we're learning about two things at once.

Laura: Oh, there's, ah, where you fucked up.

Ron: Why it's called periodicity is because, you know, on the periodic table we, um, we call the columns groups. Group one, group two.

Laura: Yeah.

Ron: The rows we can call periods. Oh, period one, period two.

Laura: Oh, it does say period on my periodic. Periodic. Yeah, that's why it's called a periodic table.

Ron: Yeah.

Laura: You think that would have come up before. Okay, my mind is all over the walls right now, Ron.

The magnetic pull of different positively charged nuclei varies between them

Ron: So now.

Laura: Now. So now I want you to draw Mario's penis.

Ron: Actually, no, let's just look at, um. Actually, could you draw glycerol out? But where you've got the hydroxyl group, draw out the bond in between the oxygen and the hydrogen.

Laura: All right, CC my plan mate. You are now in a bond. Your bum smells like a pond. Uh, mhm. Which one is joined to the carbon out of what? The hydroxyl group.

Ron: Work it out. How many bonds does an oxygen do? How many bonds does a hydrogen do?

Laura: 2 for oxygen, 1 for hydrogen.

Ron: So if the hydrogen is bonded to the carbon, where does the oxygen go?

Laura: In the bin. Okay, done it.

Ron: Okay, cool. So thinking about this concept of periodicity that we're just learned about there. So you've got a carbon.

Laura: Mhm.

Ron: Joined to an oxygen joined to a hydrogen. What is a covalent bond?

Laura: Where they share an electron.

Ron: Where they share a pair of electrons.

Laura: They share a pair of electrons.

Ron: So what you've got is a positively, ah, charged nucleus. A pair of negatively charged electrons and Then another positively charged nucleus. Pair of electrons. Nucleus in a chain. Right.

Laura: Mm mhm.

Ron: And what we've just learned through this concept of periodicity is that the magnetic pull of those different positively charged nuclei varies between them. So what's going to happen to the pair of negatively charged electrons in between them?

Laura: They're going to pull the hydrogen and the carbons like, close. The oxygen is going to pull the hydrogen close to it.

Ron: Not the hydrogen, just the electron. Just the electrons. Yeah, yeah. So this is what's called a polar bond because now suddenly the, the whole sort of m magnetic, um, balance of the molecule is thrown off a little bit. So between.

Laura: Oxygen's being a bit selfish.

Ron: Tis. Tis indeed between, um, carbon and oxygen. Um, the difference isn't huge.

Laura: Yeah. Because they're quite near each other. Periodically speaking. They're in the same period, Ron.

Ron: Exactly. Whereas if you think about hydrogen, what is the nucleus of a hydrogen?

Laura: It's simply one proton.

Ron: Exactly. So the pulling power by the, um, uh, by the oxygen versus the hydrogen is massive. Um, I'm just trying to find a periodic table that's got the periodicity on it. Because you can get them, um, because they're, they're the. We have like empirical just numbers for, for this. Can't m. Find it. Anyway, when it's between the carbon and the oxygen, there's a slight pull towards the oxygen. When there's a pull between the hydrogen and the oxygen, the oxygen wins out massively. Right. Pulls it in. Hang on a sec. Okay. Um, yeah, so apologies, I've confused my terminology slightly there. The, um, phenomenon of um, this getting increased across the period, that is called periodicity. The actual force that brings in the electrons. Oxygen has a higher electronegativity than electronegativity. Yeah, that's that. Apologies. I got.

Laura: We're a new band. We're kind of 80s inspired, but a little bit of fat boy slim. Uh, we call it like electronegativity. It's sort of like 80s emo. Do you know what I mean?

Ron: So to give you.

Laura: It's the fish. Squirrel.

Ron: Are you losing focus, Laura?

Laura: Yeah. You stopped for like 15 minutes to Google stuff.

Ron: Oh, I stopped for two minutes.

Laura: Yeah.

Ron: You back in? No. Do we have to

00:30:00

Ron: stop?

Laura: No, I got this little fish. Pig.

Ron: So oxygen's electronegativity. Well, um, carbon's ElectroneGativity score is 2.55. Okay. Hydrogen.

Laura: Hang on, hang on.

Oxygen disrupts electrons around the hydrogen way more than carbon does

I didn't write it down because Mackie was talking. Um, right. What? Oxygen equals 2.55.

Ron: No, carbon equals 2.55.

Laura: Okay, carbon equals 2.55.

Ron: Hydrogen only 2.2.

Laura: Hydrogen, 2.2. Oh, it's not that big a difference, is it?

Ron: No. Whereas oxygen is 3.44.

Laura: Whoa, Mackie, did you hear that, Maggie, you don't even know about any of these concepts. All you know about is your ball. And cuddles. Must be so nice to be you. That's basically what I was like before this fucking podcast.

Ron: So you can see that the, the oxygen is disrupting the electrons around the hydrogen way, way more than the carbon is.

Laura: Yeah, it's a disruptor in the industry.

Ron: Yeah. These, uh, are called powelling electronegativity values.

Laura: Well, now you're pronouncing words weird. It's pulling, Ron.

Ron: Powelling.

Laura: Pulling.

Ron: Powelling.

Laura: Puala, suck in the cheeks.

Ron: Biology.

Laura: How do you spell Pauling?

Ron: Like the name Paul with ing in the end.

Laura: Pauling. Pauling. It's a Pauling.

Ron: Got there first.

Laura: Did you miss me while I was away, Mackie? I was gobbling.

Ron: Laura, put the dog down.

Laura: I can't. She's so healthy. Can you believe younger sister of the podcast's dog, Jock is nine?

Ron: I feel like I've only met Jock, like three times.

Laura: Okay, look at this drawing of a horse's eyeball.

Ron: Oh, yeah.

Laura: There'S some random crap on this desk.

Do you remember the basic structure of a lipid

Ron: Okay, so now we're gonna draw a fatty acid. Okay.

Laura: Okay.

Ron: Do you remember the basic structure of a lipid?

Laura: No, don't think we've discussed.

Ron: We did a gcse.

Laura: Oh, that. No, I've forgotten. Gcse.

Ron: So lipids, uh, are fats. Um, fats are at their simplest form, just a hydrocarbon chain of carbons with hydrogens coming off.

Laura: Oh, yeah, I remember this. And then you get saturated fats.

Ron: Saturated and unsaturated. Um, fats. Yeah. So draw one of those five long, but leave one of the carbon, one of the carbons at the end bare.

Laura: Okay, so I'm gonna do C C, C C C. And then I'm gonna surround four of the Cs with Ah Hs.

Ron: Yes, please. Perfect.

Laura: Okay. I'm sure something about this will be wrong that I cannot possibly foresee, but here goeth. Ha huh. Ha ha ha. Huh. Like this?

Ron: No, that's spot on.

Laura: Woo. I feel like we're doing a lot of content today.

Ron: Yeah, because this is the stuff I know about. I'm m not even really using notes. We're going to turn that from just a lipid into a fatty acid. How do we do that? We add a carboxyl acid group to the end.

Laura: Hey.

Ron: Okay, so on that bare carbon at the end, I want you to do a double bond to an oxygen.

Laura: Whoa.

Ron: And then add a hydroxyl group as well.

Laura: Just A. Oh, yeah. Okay. I've drawn the connection between the O, uh, and the H as well, Ron.

Ron: Great. What we've got there, obviously is two oxygens in the mix.

Laura: Okay. They're gonna be throwing off all the polar bonds.

Ron: Absolutely. And one of them's a bloody double as well.

Laura: Doubler.

Ron: Yeah. Which only, um, confuses the situation little bit more. Um, do you remember what makes something an acid and what makes something an alkali?

Laura: No.

Ron: Do you remember to do with concentrations of H ions or. Oh, ions.

Laura: No.

Ron: Do you remember talking about this? I know sometimes I don't put in the effort. I should, but this is. This is one of the ones where it's just like. It's really hard doing this bit.

Laura: I do put in effort, though.

00:35:00

Ron: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I do recognise you're operating at max capacity, but it's not good enough sometimes.

With acids, the bond becomes really, really unstable. But not impossible

Laura: Do you want to stop here so we don't spoil what's been a lovely episode?

Ron: Um, how long have we been recording?

Laura: 35 minutes.

Ron: Well, we'll just finish this thought and then we can stop. But it's just this tough sometimes. Okay.

Laura: Can I be a me, Ron? Just great swathes of my life aren't in my brain.

Ron: Yeah. As I've said before, it's. It's fine for you. I just wouldn't be happy. What you effectively get with the. With the carboxyl acid, you've got the oxygen on the double bond pulls not just one pair of electrons closer to itself, but two. That then throws off the feng shui of the carbon. Meaning that the carbon then pulls electrons away from the oxygen. The oxygen, yes.

Laura: I thought the oxygen was pulling the electrons off the carbon.

Ron: Usually would, but because four electrons essentially have been moved away from this carbon, its electronegativity increases, giving it more sway to even overturn.

Laura: Oh, I see. So the double bond pulls, then it's pulling off that single one.

Ron: Exactly.

Laura: Okay.

Ron: Yeah, yeah. Which then means that that oxygen in the hydroxyl group, it would anyway, but even stronger because it's also just had some electrons robbed from it is gonna yank on the electrons. It's gonna pull on the electrons, um, that it's sharing with that hydrogen. Um, and what you then get is a really high propensity for that hydrogen to dissociate from the molecule, which is what makes this an acid. What does dissociate Mean, unjoined breaks the bond.

Laura: Right. So the hydrogen, the bond gets broken.

Ron: Well, yeah.

Laura: Then what happens are the electrons then just free?

Ron: Well, with acids, what happens is. Yeah, yeah, you'd get two different ions. 1h1 fatty acid minus ion. But the reason why I said dissociate rather than sort of, you know, the bond empirically breaks is because with acids, it's kind of a cycle of. It breaks apart, it rejoins. It breaks apart, it rejoins.

Laura: Okay.

Ron: M. It's just the, because of the oxygens in that functional group, that bond becomes really, really unstable. But not impossible.

Laura: Okay, okay. So that's an unstable bond.

Now, where is ripe for a bonding on glycerol

Ron: Now, the last little brain nugget that will try and get you to pinch off. Looking at glycerol.

Laura: Yeah.

Ron: Where on that molecule do you think something would join it? Like where, where, where. Knowing what you know about sort of atoms now and like this, this concept of electronegativity, we. What, where is ripe for a bonding on glycerol?

Laura: Well, would you have that dissociation thing with the oxygen and the hydrogen there?

Ron: Yeah, exactly. So around the oxygen. Because that's going to be destabilising those bonds around it. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's, that's the bit that I'm, uh, getting at.

Laura: The oxygen is going to be the problem.

Ron: So then on each of those, um, oxygens, a fatty acid can join, um, and it joins on the hydroxyl group. Um, of that before. Remember when we talk about monomers and polymers, we talked about hydrolysis reactions. Sorry, rather condensation reactions. Oh, no, condensation, because it produces water.

Laura: Oh, yeah.

Ron: So what you get is you get a condensation reaction three times in between the fatty acid and the glycerol. Um, so water remove leaves, um, it. And then you get the glycerol forming a bond to the fatty acids and you get something that looks like this.

Laura: She's going to the WhatsApp web to have a look. Crikey. Crumbles. What's an R?

Ron: So R is a, um, basically a placeholder because that's where the lipid chain would be on the fatty acid. But we don't know how long it is. There's no point in growing, in drawing it all out. So we just call it an R group.

00:40:00

Ron: You also see that in amino acids and stuff. Um, when you've got the variable R group, that could be something else. So that's just a lipid chain going out that way.

Laura: Okay.

Ron: Um, then, yeah, you've got the, the glyceride forming that backbone of three carbons there at the top, each of those still connected to one oxygen. But then rather than just an H on the end, we go straight into the fatty acid. We've got the C that's double connected to an oxygen there, this bond that connects the carbon, carbon to oxygen to carbon with a double oxygen attached to it. That is your Esther Bond. That's another functional group Esther Bond.

Laura: Well, that would get the. The right wing lads in my comment section angry. If I was playing Esther Bond, then I am. Bond, Esther Bond.

Ron: And there's letters in it as well, which is a Bond thing. So, Laura, can you just draw out.

Laura: I'm finished.

Ron: No, draw out a quick S, Laura. Draw out just a quick Esther Bond.

Laura: To finish it off what an Esther Bond is.

Ron: I've just said it loads of times.

Laura: Gloria Esteban. Is that the O?

Ron: Double C is the carbon to the oxygen to the carbon with the double O.

Laura: Yeah. There.

Ron: Uh, you've just drawn a carbon with a double O. You're too thick to help. Right, we're stopping. You're the child that's going to get left behind. You can't be helped.

Laura: You hated the old system as well.

Ron: Did I?

Laura: Yeah. You always telling me off for writing the word episode.

Ron: Yeah, that's a different thing. And also, I would never told you off for writing the word episode. I just didn't see why I had to write the word episode so that.

Laura: They all look the same now. It's just season two, number ten. That's much less.

Ron: We're talking about different things, but that's okay.

Laura: Oh, what do you hate now?

Ron: Oh, it just isn't like, um, I don't know where we are anymore. What number is this in total?

Laura: Oh, that's in the spreadsheet. Don't worry, I've kept up with where we are in total. It's episode 149 in total. That's so. Actually, today we're going to record the.

Ron: 150Th episode M. Maybe that's a mention, uh, in the intro outro thing. Just for the notes on that one.

Laura: Yeah, yeah, I'll do that when I edit it.

Ron: Lovely.

Laura: Should we do a quiz?

Ron: Yeah.

Laura: It's gonna be a bloodbath.

Ron: Are we recording?

Laura: Yeah.

Ron: I don't know if it is gonna be a bloodbath, because I feel like you got what we were talking about.

Laura: How much detail are you gonna ask about it?

Ron: In a decent amount.

Laura: What is a functional group? Bud: One mark

All right, Laura, we're gonna start easy. Lowball it. Okay. One mark. Simple pimples. What's A functional group.

Laura: An O and an H. No, that's a hydroxyl group. Fuck. A functional group is.

Ron: I think I almost burnt my house down earlier.

Laura: Did you? How come?

Ron: You see my air fryer? And at some point, the air was fried too hard and something had flicked up onto the heating element, so just, like, smoke started coming out the top of it. But then I had a look, and it was just like some schmutz on the heating element.

Laura: But see, this is where it's so much safer to have an air fryer than the old deep fryers of yore.

Ron: Um.

Laura: Okay, is that one mark for.

Ron: Naming a hydroxyl group? Well, actually, my question number two was gonna be, what is a hydroxyl group? So I will give you that mark now.

Laura: Great. A functional group is like a group of atoms that all, um, have similar properties, like, react in similar ways.

Ron: I feel like you get it, but take another run up at the explanation.

Laura: I never know what you mean by that. As if I didn't put all of the thoughts I have to have together in a sentence the first time I say it.

Ron: Okay, I won't give you another chance.

Laura: What do you want me to say?

Ron: Um, because it's not a group of atoms that have similar properties. It's a sort of a molecular structure that

00:45:00

Ron: recurs in a lot of molecules and gives that structure of a set of properties.

Laura: And you thought I was just going to swallow a couple of times, blink once, and then say that instead of what I say?

Ron: No, I thought you might have thought about the fact that it happens in molecules or the fact that it's more about sort of the configuration or the shape of it, rather than just being a collection of atoms.

Laura: Uh, I didn't know about any of that stuff.

Ron: Bud, I'm never gonna give up on you. I'm always gonna expect more and, uh, hope that you can do better. You've given up. But that doesn't mean I have.

Laura: I haven't given up. I tried really hard.

What's a fatty acid? And this is for 3 marks. Fatty acid is a molecule of lipid

Ron: What's a fatty acid? And this is for 3 marks. So there are three things I need you to say.

Laura: Fatty acid is a molecule of lipid that has a hydroxyl group in the molecule. 3, 2. Oh, that is better than the zero I thought was coming out of your face.

Ron: Well, it's because I actually meant to ask you what triglyceride is. What's triglyceride?

Laura: I, uh, have no idea.

Ron: For three marks?

Laura: Don't know. A lipid. Look at this tiny jug.

Ron: Oh, yeah. Um, no, it's A. It's three fatty acids joined together by a glycerol molecule with Esther bonds in between them.

Laura: Esther bonds. I forgot about Esther bond.

Ron: Okay, so that's zero out of three.

Laura: No, because you have to give me the marks for the question. You actually have.

Ron: I have. I've given you two out of three for those ones and zero out of three for that one.

Laura: Okay, fair.

Laura, please explain what a polar bond is and why it happens

Ron: Uh, all right, Laura, for three marks again, please explain what a polar bond is and why it happens.

Laura: Okay, I remember this bit. A polar bond is, um. Is that me or you?

Ron: Me. I'm just gonna. Mute.

Laura: Mute. Um, I hate that we're recording on April Fool's Day. All I've thought about all day is the word tricko. Um, a polar bond is when, uh, there's a covalent bond between within a molecule and the polarity of one atom is much stronger than other atoms within the bonds. So the strength of the pull of, let's say an oxygen atom, M pulls harder on the shared electrons because it's closer in and has a stronger charge, um, than the hydrogen or whatever that it's linking to. And so the atoms get pulled in closer to that atom, uh, that. Well, it's nucleus. So therefore the. It affects the structure of the molecule and the bonding.

Ron: It's not called polarity. What, what's the property that we're sort of talking about there? Have another go at it.

Laura: Charge.

Ron: It's. It's related, but not quite. Okay, um, why. So you, you mentioned that sort of the. The edge of an oxygen atom, like, is closer into it than other things. Why is that?

Laura: Because of the number of shells that it has in relation to the number of, ah.

Ron: Ah.

Laura: Well, it's affected by the number of shells on the atom and the number of protons in the nucleus. So the more protons, the stronger the charge.

Ron: And why does the charge affect the size of it?

Laura: What do you mean?

Ron: Why does the number of protons, the charge of the nucleus, affect the size of the atom?

Laura: Because the protons have positive charge. So the more of them there are, the more positive charge there is. So the more they can hold.

Ron: Yeah. What's the. The other side of that, uh, sort of equation. They've got the positive charge so they.

Laura: Can hold more electrons.

Ron: Then the electrons are negative, and it pulls them in closer.

Laura: Yeah, yeah.

Ron: Not necessarily about being able to hold more stronger charge pulls

00:50:00

Ron: in that outer, uh, ring closer. Yeah, yeah. Um, okay, I'll give you two out of three for that. Um, the. The only thing that you missed out was, um, uh, just the. The property is just electronegativity.

Laura: Oh, uh, I forgot about that word.

Ron: Yeah. I did mistakenly call it periodicity. Um, for a lot of the lesson.

Laura: Um, periodicity. I'm making a joke and thinking it sounded like David Bowie's music.

Ron: Electronegativity.

Laura: Yeah. Shame, shame, shame, shame.

Ron: You know, I mean, that song's called Fame.

Laura: Oh.

Ron: I think that just says a lot about how you feel about yourself in the industry you're in.

An R group is a variable placeholder when you're drawing a molecule

Laura, what's an R? Uh, group for one. Mark.

Laura: I remember thinking R was an annoying name. No, no memory at all.

Ron: An R group is sort of a variable placeholder that you can use when you're drawing a molecule.

Laura: Interesting.

Ron: So, for example, with amino acids, they. The base of them all has the same structure. Yeah. And then you would just do like it going to an R because there are 20 diff. Well, there's more than that. But in humans there's 20 different amino acids. So that R could represent any of them. But you know that you're looking at an amino acid.

Laura: Yeah.

Ron: Last one, please. Draw an ester and just, uh, on either side of it, cap it with R groups, I should say, as well, um, you only got two out of three for the fatty acid because it doesn't have a hydroxyl group on it. It's got a carboxylic acid group on it. No. What have you drawn?

Laura: I don't know.

Ron: What, what, what is that? Because I'm pretty sure it's the one that you can name.

Laura: A lipid.

Ron: No. What functional group have you drawn there? What, what, what functional group is that?

Laura: An R group?

Ron: No, the R group's not a functional group. R group's a variable placeholder. You've got a hydrocarbon chain there.

Laura: Yeah.

Ron: What's the functional group that you've attached to it?

Laura: A hydroxyl group.

Ron: Yeah. So it's not an ester, is it? It's a hydroxyl group.

Laura: Right. Don't know what an ester was.

Ron: An ester it would be. So you do R, uh, connected to C. That C would be double bonded to one oxygen and then single bonded to another, which would be single bonded to another carbon. And then that would have two hydrogens coming off it and another R group.

Laura: That's nowhere in my notes. I have to assume we did this at the end.

Ron: Yeah, I think we probably did. All right, Laura. Well, um, yeah, probably. Probably that one would have been out of two. So if I just work out, um, what you've got there. Just do the old Mathos five, um, out of 14.

Laura: Pretty bad.

Ron: Felt better when you were doing it, but that was actually bad.

Laura: That was really. Sure. Five, yeah. Wow, that's really bad.

Ron: Yeah.

Laura: A level's really hard.

Ron: You got one for the hydroxyl group, two for the fatty acid and two for the polar bond. And that was it. You said a lot.

Laura: Yeah. Oh, well, there's always next time. There we go. I don't know if you can hear that in the background. That's husband of the podcaster teaching phonics to child of the podcast. It's a whole new thing. It's really terrifying. I think primary school is the only place in my life I've really ever excelled and now they've changed it all and, um, we're a little way off primary school, a child of the podcast. But we are trying to work out what we can teach her now to just make her seem really rad when she gets there. And they've. It's not just letters now. And it's not even like when I was

00:55:00

Laura: little it was P for Penguin, then it was P for Penguin, now it's P for penguin. You're not supposed to put the vowel sound for it. So, you know, not S for sausage, it's S for sausage. And you have to remember not to add a vowel sound when you supply it to them. We've, um, also screwed up and we've taught her all the letters in capitals. So she's probably going to be a serial killer. That's terrifying. But she'll probably start with us so we won't even know the extent of her crimes. Um, right, enjoy your weeks everybody and thank you for listening.

Ronald: I'm going to New Zealand at the end of this week

I'm, uh, I'm going to New Zealand at the end of this week, so if you're listening in real time the week that this is released, what's that about? 21st of April. Um, if you've got any tips for taking a three year old on a 27 hour flight, if you've got any tips for taking me on a 27 hour flight, I think I've been so preoccupied with wondering what to do with her, I haven't even thought about how I'm going to cope. Um, if you've got recommendations for Auckland and, um, Wellington or things that you can do with ease within about a day of being in either of those places, let me know. Um, and if you want to come to those shows, let me know. Well, don't let me know, actually, just buy a ticket and I'll see you there. Uh, and I'm at m the Edinburgh Festival. Buy tickets for that. Gosh, there's lots going on, isn't there? I'm just so busy. I'm such a dreamy, dreamy little girl. Um, hey, Ronald, be back next week and we'll catch up on all the stuff that. I was probably supposed to stay on this one this week. Um, but for now, thank you for being the loveliest listenership that's ever existed. I know other podcasts have other shiny features, but I do think our shiniest feature. Iest thing is you. And I'm very grateful for you all. Have a lovely week. Take care. Class dismissed. M.

00:56:50