2: Molecular visualisation of polysaccharides

Question 1

What is the most widely used molecular visualisation software?

Answer 1

JMol

Question 2

This could be a question (I don’t know):

Recognise amylose (a form of starch), cellulose and glycogen from their chemicals structure on JMol. (p21)

Answer 2

just remember:

cellulose = straight
amylose = unbranched, helical
glycogen = branched

Question 3

What can molecular visualisations be used to show? Give an example.

Answer 3

• interactions between molecules
• e.g hydrogen bonds forming at regular intervals between parallel array of cellulose molecules (to form cellulose microfibrils)