How can you tell whether the chemical formula for a compound represents a protein or a carbohydrate?
1 Answer
Nov 22, 2015
if it contains carbon, hydrogen and oxygen only in the ratio of 1:2:1, then it is a carbohydrate. If it contains carbon, hydrogen, oxygen and nitrogen, then it might be a protein.
Explanation:
Proteins are made of amino acids connected together. each amino acid has a carbon atom connected to four groups which are COOH, NH2, H and a variable group given the symbol R.
This R could be a H,CH3, CH2SH, and many more.
When two amino acids are connected a water molecule is removed from the formula.
A protein can be made of several hundred amino acids.
Because of all the previous, the formula of the protein is very complicated.
