Author Archives: tristan ruigrok

The Killer That Could Save Your Life: Snake Venom

Snakes are a root of fear for many people due to the dangerous venom they produce. Around 5.4 million people are bitten by snakes each year, 2.7 million of which are envenomings. Of these, up to 180 thousand cause death, and three times as many result in amputations or permanent disabilities. However, snake venom may also save your life. Snake venom has been used to treat a variety of conditions since the 1930s, including cancer, Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, and strokes.

Snake venom contains a variety of compounds, including a variety of powerful enzymatic and non-enzymatic peptides. Enzymes are biological catalysts used to promote the reaction of chemical compounds. Enzymes found in snake venom have a variety of applications, from antiviral and antibacterial properties. Further, several non-enzymatic peptides, such as 3FTxs and disintegrin, found in snake venom have been used as therapeutic agents for HIV, muscular dystrophy, cancer, and a variety of other ailments.

Tertiary structure of 3FTx non-enzymatic protein. Source

 

 

3FTxs, or Three-Finger Toxins, are a large group of non-enzymatic peptides found in venom that have been widely studied. Their identifiable structure appears due to the presence of several disulfide bonds in the molecule. The wide variety of these neurotoxins and the breadth of their family allow them to have a wide variety of uses, and their prevalence in venom among several snake species made them very researchable. 3FTxs have been used to treat drug-resistant HIV strains, multiple sclerosis, muscular dystrophy and other debilitating conditions.

 

 

However, snake venom comes at a cost, and an expensive one. Snake venom samples can cost anywhere from 250-4000$ per gram. These prices are in great part due to the immense difficulty in extracting snake venom. Snake venom extraction is done through a process called milking, a dangerous and tedious job, during which milkers run the risk of being bitten. Further to maintain the snake’s health, only small quantities of venom can be extracted at a time, with milkings occurring about every 30-60 days. This maintains the high price, making many therapeutics inaccessible to the general public.

Snake milking venom extraction. Source

 

Not only is venom extraction dangerous, but it also comes at a cost to the animal. Often snakes are kept in plastic bins stacked in rows in facilities, kept for extraction of venom. Groups have argued against the ethics of this, as the snake’s lifetime is significantly decreased by this treatment. Synthetic production of snake venom is an evolving field in recent years but has yet to be a more affordable and energy-efficient alternative to snake venom usage.

 

The importance of snake venom in the production of therapeutic agents cannot be underestimated, however, the mal-treatment of the animals, even if they frighten us, is an important consideration in the development of these life-saving products, particularly if those products are only accessible to people with enough money to cover the cost.

 

~Tristan Ruigrok

 

Environmental Hazard to Reusable Material: Converting Plastics and CO2 into Fuel

Plastic waste management has become a serious issue over the last few decades. In 2019, the total amount of plastic produced since 1950 totaled just over 9.5 billion tons, and plastic production hasn’t slowed down, as 400 million tons were added to that in 2020.

The chemical bonds that make up plastics are hard to break and do not degrade in the environment quickly. This makes plastic waste challenging to deal with, leading to a large amount of plastic being discarded or incinerated.

While people have been recycling since the late 1980s, only about 6% of annual waste is recycled, and only a further 20% of that stays recycled.  Current recycling methods consist of mechanical recycling, a process by which the plastic is ground or melted down into a new product, or chemical recycling, a process by which chemical additives break down the plastic into more manageable pieces to be used as raw material. However, both methods are not environmentally friendly or cheap, leading to a high volume of plastics that are not recycled (see below).

The final fate of plastics over 65 years. only 1.72% of plastics remain recycled.

Finding new ways to deal with plastic waste is a heavy focus for environmental scientists, leading to catalysis, electrochemistry, and photochemistry developments. One such method, developed by Dr. Resier and his team at the University of Cambridge, has found a way to deal with this waste in an environmentally clean way. Using a perovskite (PVK) based photocathode and a copper-palladium alloy anode in combination with a CO2 reduction catalyst, they transformed PET plastics and CO2 into a variety of useable fuels and by-products, such as carbon monoxide, hydrogen gas, and glycolic acid.

Electrochemical pathway of CO2 reduction into CO and byproducts.

The photoelectrochemical system works upon sunlight exposure under zero applied voltage and generates products 10-100 times faster than other catalytic methods. Further, the catalyst system is not sensitive to the introduction of bio-organic molecules; in fact, the presence of small amounts of food products could increase the activity of the system.

However, this process is anything but cheap. The copper-palladium alloy anode is not cheap to fabricate, and the materials required are rare, palladium being over 15 times rarer than platinum. This increases startup costs, which is not favorable to most companies who could instead dump the waste.

While advancements in this technology are still needed, there is a positive outlook for the future of plastics and environmental contaminants. We may yet be able to save our fragile, yet vital planet from our own advancement.

 

Tristan Ruigrok

Gone In a Bang: The Reality Behind Super Creatine

Bang Energy has become a well-known and publically recognized brand in the fitness industry. However, they have come under scrutiny after mismarketing some of their products.

Bang Energy Logo

Introduced in 2012, the branded Super-Creatine supplement found in many of their beverages has been shown to be ineffective and resulted in legal action from competing brand Monster Energy.

 

Many Fitness enthusiasts supplement their diet with creatine, most commonly in the form of creatine monohydrate, an amino acid that promotes energy production in muscle cells during high-intensity exercise.

 

Lasha Talakhadze breaks world record Clean and Jerk at Rio Olympics 473kg

Supplementation of creatine increases the body’s natural concentration of the amino acid, leading to higher levels of available ATP (stored energy molecule) in muscle cells during exercise. Creatine monohydrate remains one of the most well-researched fitness supplements in the world to this day.

 

In 2012, Bang released their popular Bang energy drink, aimed at gym goers with a new supplement in the mix; Super-Creatine. Super-Creatine, or creatyl-l-leucine, was a new revolution in creatine supplementation due to its binding with l-leucine, increasing its ability to pass through protein channels. However, a new study shows this is not the case.

A study performed at the University of Manitoba on differences in the effects of creatine monohydrate and creatyl-l-leucine supplementation suggests that the l-leucine bonded creatine is rendered useless, not more effective, than regular creatine.

Creatine Monohydrate Chemical Structure

The researchers found that creatine levels in muscle and brain cells increased slightly with creatine monohydrate supplementation from the control. However, creatyl-l-luecine showed no effect on creatine levels in the body, suggesting that super-creatine is anything but super.

 

This study performed under funding from Monster Energy was released in early 2022, which has led to lawsuits from the competing company regarding the misinformation in Bang’s products. In September 2022, Monster energy won 293 million dollars in their case against bang for the false advertising of Super Creatine. While Bang Energy stated they would remove the super creatine labeling from their packaging, it is still found in bold letters at the top of their cans.

 

-Tristan Ruigrok