Molecular Interactions in Biology

Introduction to Molecular Interaction with Relevance to Biology

Before talking about molecule and their interactions relevant to biology it would be worthwhile to just think about the essence of biology. Yes I am talking about the life forms, which form the basis of the discipline of biology. Lets just go through the characteristics of any living organism and see what is it that defines being alive. This is something which we have been talking about very early days of education.

The features which together lead to an individual or organism bring called alive include the following:

1. High degree of complexity and microscopic organization.
2. Systems for extracting, transforming and utilizing energy from the environment.
3. Defined fraction for each of an organisms components and regulated interaction among them.
4. Mechanism for sensing and responding to alternations in the surrounding.
5. A capacity for precise self recognition and self assembly.
6. A capacity to change over time by gradual evolution.

As we proceed, we will find out that all these above mentioned characters that appear so vast and complex at the first glance are actually the result of molecular interactions.

A  Bit about the Origin of Life

 At this point a small discussion upon the origin of life seems worthwhile.  Though different people have different views on how life originated, the theory that seems most apt is as follows.

“About fifteen billion years ago, the universe arose as a cataclysmic eruption of hot energy rich sub atomic particles. Within seconds the simplest elements hydrogen and helium were formed. As the universe expanded and cooled, material condensed under the influence of gravity to form stars. Some stars became enormous and exploded as supernovae, releasing the energy needed to fuse simpler atomic nuclei into the more complex elements. Thus were produced, the Earth itself and the chemical elements found on Earth today. About four billion years ago, life arose- simple microorganisms with the ability to extract energy from chemical compounds and later from sunlight, which they used to make a vast array of more complex biomolecules from the simple elements and compounds on the Earth’s surface.”

This section on molecular interaction basically highlights the role of these tiny little molecules in biology.

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