Human body – Amino acids take over

I’ve attempted to get my head around what transduction means and learn some basics about amino acids. But I feel I’m at a very basic level here and am surely missing the fundamentals that I need to add layers to.

Questions

Easily confused with his grandfather, Danish anatomist Caspar Bartholin the Younger used a 1678 work to describe a pair of glands that now take his name. Also known as the greater vestibular glands, to which part of the body do they provide lubrication?

VAGINA

Not to be confused with the 18th century poet of the same name, anatomist William Cowper published the supposedly plagiarised “The Anatomy of Humane Bodies” in 1698 and gives his name to two male glands that serve to neutralise the acidity of which tube, this being to prepare for the passage of sperm cells?

URETHRA (The glands are also called bulbourethral glands)

Useful to remember the stages of embryonic development, the mnemonic ‘Zara and Michael are Big Gaming Nerds’ stands for what five words?

ZYGOTE, MORULA, BLASTULA, GASTRULA, NEURLA

Located on either side of the thalamus and housing the hippocampus and amygdala, as what cortex is the limbic system also known?

PALEOMAMMALIAN CORTEX

The bottom nine of them being fused, how many vertebrae usually make up the human spine?

THIRTY-THREE

Sensory transduction occurs in the nervous system when an arriving stimulus is converted into an electric impulse by what kind of cell?

RECEPTOR

The process of what kind of transduction involves reception by the cell, that stage seeing it receive information that the environment has changed, through to the change that takes place in the cell?

SIGNAL TRANSDUCTION

First discovered in the protein casein in 1846, the amino acid tyrosine gets its name from the Greek word for what?

CHEESE

A non-essential member of the famous group of twenty amino acids, tyrosine is designated by which letter of the alphabet?

Y

As three of the well known 20 amino acids begin with the letter T, tyrosine has been assigned with a Y and tryptophan a W. Able to be produced from E. coli, which amino acid gets given the honour of using the T?

THREONINE

One of the characteristics of all the amino acids is that they contain an amino group, this being represented by what chemical formula?

NH2

Along with the NH2 amino group, all amino acids contain what kind of group that is represented by the formula COOH?

CARBOXYL GROUP

In an amino acid the NH2 amino group and COOH carboxyl group are attached to an atom of what chemical element?

CARBON

In the general formula for an amino acid the alpha-carbon atom is always attached to a NH2 amino group, a COOH carboxyl group and an atom of what element?

HYDROGEN

Human body

I’m some way off understanding neural crests, but we have to try and divide what for me is a hideously difficult subject somehow.

Questions

The term coming from the Greek for ‘ray’, what family of proteins form thin filaments in muscle fibrils?

ACTINS

Splitting into two branches following the initial stem cell, what two common progenitors occur during the process of hematopoiesis, later on in the process becoming specialist cells such as basophils and natural killer cells?

MYELOID AND LYMPHOID

Histones were discovered in 1884 by which Rostock-born German biochemist who won the 1910 Nobel Prize in Physiology for his work on determining the chemical composition of nucleic acids?

ALBRECHT KOSSEL

A virus-tackling interferon is one of what large class of proteins, molecules used to communicate between cells to trigger the protective defences of the immune system?

CYTOKINES

Which German physiologist and histologist who was son of a Lutheran theologian is best remembered for discovering rhodopsin? He also has eponymous cells located in the lacrimal gland.

FRANZ BOLL

Also the word for the basal segment of a spider’s leg, what Latin word means ‘hip’?

COXA

What term is used for the superior border of the wing of ilium, the large expanded part of the bone that surrounds the pelvis?

(ILIAC) CREST

What is the upper of the three bones forming the acetabulum, covering about two fifths of the hip bone like the lowest of the three bones, the ischium?

ILIUM

What is the third bone of the acetabulum, somewhere near the midline of the hip bone and covering about one fifth of the ox coxae, with the other four fifths split between the ilium at the top and the ischium at the bottom?

PUBIS

From the Ancient Greek, what does ‘apoptosis’ literally mean, where cells undergo morphology or characteristic cell changes and programmed cell death?

FALLING OFF

What bulge of the plasma cell membrane of a cell is most commonly seen as the first stage of apoptosis, kind of looking like a blister?

BLEBBING

What portmanteau word is given to a family of protease enzymes that play essential roles in programmed cell death, initiating apoptosis?

CASPASES (Cysteine-aspartic proteases)

Gastrulation, part of early embryonic development, occurs after cleavage and the formation of what, that is made up of one layer that folds inward and enlarges?

BLASTULA

Formed during gastrulation, what primary gut develops into the mesoderm and endoderm of an animal?

ARCHENTERON

Also called a cleavage cavity or segmentation cavity, which fluid-filled cavity formed during gastrulation gives rise to the gastrula and the primitive yolk sac?

BLASTOCOEL

What is the other part of the cerebral cortex, making up about 10% with the neocortex at 90%?

ALLOCORTEX

Which part of the brain means ‘cloak’ in Latin? It is the grey and white matter that cover the upper surface of the cerebrum in vertebrates.

PALLIUM

The subfields of the hippocampus CA1, CA2 and CA3 stand for what, referencing an Egyptian deity?

CORNU AMMON / AMMON’S HORN

What with the initials DG, is an interlocking part of the hippocampus?

DENTATE GYRUS

Found in the head, what is a vestigial organ in some humans also known as Jacobson’s organ?

VOMERONASAL (ORGAN)

The opiate codeine was discovered by which Rennes-born French chemist in 1832 who also identified the first amino acid in 1806?

PIERRE JEAN ROBIQUET

What was the first amino acid, discovered by Pierre Jean Robiquet in 1806?

ASPARAGINE

Along with epithelial, what three types of tissue make up the four that exist in the human body?

MUSCLE, NERVE, CONNECTIVE

What is a benign tumour of epithelial tissue with glandular origin, glandular characteristics, or both? It can grow on adrenal glands and the pituitary gland among others.

ADENOMA

Named for a British pathologist and with symptoms including difficulties with lactation, what syndrome occurs after giving birth as a result of necrosis of the pituitary gland, usually as a result of low blood pressure or a large shock during delivery?

SHEEHAN’S SYNDROME

Isolated and named in 1958 by a Yale University team led by Alan Lerner, the primary role of the pineal gland, called by Rene Descartes ‘the seat of the soul’, is to create which hormone?

MELATONIN

The pineal gland is located in which part of the brain, near the centre in between the two hemispheres?

EPITHALAMUS

With functions including the regulation of sleep, the large mass of grey matter known as the thalamus has a name from the Greek meaning what?

CHAMBER

How many bones is the skull said to consist of, with the cranial part consisting of eight?

TWENTY-TWO

Of the eight cranial bones, the ethmoid derives its name from the Greek word for what?

SIEVE

Which unpaired cranial bone sits in the middle of the skull and is shaped like a butterfly or bat?

SPHENOID

What are the two unpaired bones in the facial skeleton?

VOMER & MANDIBLE

What does the name vomer mean in Latin?

PLOUGHSHARE

Which two paired bones form the bridge of the nose?

NASAL

Which pair of ‘inferior’ bones can be found in the facial skeleton? Together with the ethmoid bone and the nasal bones, they help form the nose.

(INFERIOR) NASAL CONCHAE

Along with the gluteus maximus and gluteus minimus, which other muscle makes up the glutes?

GLUTEUS MEDIUS

The gluteus maximus is made up of muscle fascicles lying parallel with one another, and are collected together into larger bundles separated by fibrous what, with this word also finding use in the heart, tongue and nose?

SEPTA / SEPTUM

Which thin triangular muscle lies beneath the pectoralis major?

PECTORALIS MINOR

The pectoralis major’s primary functions are flexion, adduction and the internal rotation of what bone?

HUMERUS

Emerging from the pons of the brainstem, what roman numeral out of the twelve given to cranial nerves is allocated to the facial nerve, with one disease caused by dysfunction of this being Bell’s Palsy?

VII

Situated between the lungs and meaning ‘midway’, what is the central compartment of the thoracic cavity, also the sight of various tumours?

MEDIASTINUM

Transferrin is what kind of protein, which contains oligosaccharide chains attached to amino acid side-chains? One example is Miraculin, which alters human tongue receptors to recognise sour foods as sweet.

GLYCOPROTEIN

Produced in the liver, transferrin binds to and consequently mediates the transfer of what through blood plasma?

IRON

What term is used for the folding process in vertebrate embryos that includes the transformation of the neural plate into the neural tube? Neural crest cells disconnect from the epidermis to form most of the peripheral nervous system during this process.

NEURULATION

The process of neurulation begins when what flexible rod induces the formation of the central nervous system?

NOTOCHORD

The neural plate from which the neural tube and neural crest are formed is part of what outermost germ layer that is formed during earlt embryonic development?

ECTODERM

Named for a Dutch opthalmologist and genticist, which syndrome can be characterised by bright blue eyes and a white forelock, with Youtuber Stef Sanjati having the condition? Several characters in the Kimberly McCreight novel “Reconstructing Amelia” feature symptoms, with a film adaptation in the works in which Nicole Kidman is set to star.

WAARDENBURG SYNDROME