As my chemist's eyes flitted across the page, I smiled at some familiar friends on p. 51 - line structures of nucleotide base cytosine. Just
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| Source: Discover 5.2013 |
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See that nitrogen at the bottom? In the language of my sophomore organic professor, it's "very unhappy" that way. Nitrogen usually gets three bonds and a lone pair of electrons; I won't over-critique the missing dots, but there needs to be one of three things on that structure:
1. A generic R-group (meaning a new carbon chain)
2. A proton (indicating the free cytosine base)
3. A "minus" sign (indicating an anion)
Kudos to the graphic artist, though, who actually used standard chemical notation here. Many general science mags would have just used a colored-in hexagon.
*Update, 6/17/13 - As commenters have piled on, we note the empty valences on the two aromatic carbons (carbanions?), as well as questions over whether a methyl group counts as a "compound."
*Update, 6/17/13 - As commenters have piled on, we note the empty valences on the two aromatic carbons (carbanions?), as well as questions over whether a methyl group counts as a "compound."

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