Posted by I decided to look at how important iron is in the production of RBCs and the transport of oxygen. I haven’t been working since St. Patricks Day so decided against buying supplies and to use what I had laying around the house! My alpha/beta chain labels are hard to read as the dye spread quickly.
This project has a very intriguing look that it uses to describe how important Iron is in the formation and production of RBC, the display presented in the picture is representing the inside of an RBC. RBC contain 2 different types of polypeptide chains, two Alpha chains which contain 141 amino acids and two beta chains which contain 146 amino acids. Alpha and Beta chains are look similar but have different chain formation of amino acids. Next I understand the two different colors of chains differentiates between an alpha chains(yellow) and beta chains(dark blue ish). As seen in the display the 4 chains are closely intertwined and lying in the middle of each chain lies a bright orange dot. This bright orange dot that represents the heme bound to Iron. The Iron is very important because it is key to allowing the heme bind to oxygen. The last part about this project is the markings on the side of each chain. These represent the name tag for each alpha and beta chains. The top appears to have B1 and B2 in referral to Beta chains, while the bottom states A1 and A2 in referral to alpha chains. The model does a great job of describing the inside of an RBC and irons placement inside of them. I know from this project that because there are 4 chains the RBC can bind to 4 oxygen.