Mad Scientists of Etsy: dna

Friday, August 3, 2012

June - July Challenge Theme: Genetics

The theme for June / July was genetics. Only two team members tackled this challenge, but they were too good not to feature here.

First up is Helices, an original watercolor by Genevieve of SummerQuarters.

I love the addition of the accessory proteins controlling DNA transcription and gene activity. The cheery orange-red background makes this a piece I can really see hanging in a doctor's office.

Next up is this amazing collagen color spectrum by Kristin of ArtAtomic.

It doesn't look like much at first (especially at this size), but once you know what it is, you can't help but think "oooooh! COOL!" In Kristin's own words:

A color spectrum, based on the amino acid sequence of the protein Collagen. First, I wrote a program in Python, to analyze the amino acid frequencies in a sequence. Then I wrote a second program to visualize the results.

It'll be really interesting to see how the spectra change depending on the size, composition and function of the protein scanned. I'd like to see some GPCRs and other transmembrane proteins to see how they differ from globular and structural proteins.

Kristin ran the code for insulin in her program next:

These color maps are fantastic! I think a print of a scientist's favorite protein would make the perfect gift for that hard-to-buy-for nerd... and would look just as awesome in a baby's nursery as it would in a doctor's office!

Hop of over to Kristin's blog for more details.

The challenge theme for August / September is Hypatia of Alexandria - what are you going to create?

Tuesday, July 7, 2009

Easy as G C T A

June's theme featured a famous scientist, and this month was Rosalind Franklin. While you may have heard of Watson and Crick, who identified the double helix structure of DNA, it was actually thanks to Rosalind Franklin whose x-ray crystallography data allowed them to make their discovery. However it took many years before the role of Rosalind was revealed, as Watson and Crick were rather reticient with this info. Although Watson and Crick received the Nobel in 1962 (in addition to Maurice Wilkins) for their work, sadly Rosalind had already past away from cancer and thus was not part of the award (the Nobel is never awarded posthumously). So several of our team members took on the challenge to interpret this theme and celebrate the life of a scientist whose groundbreaking work is often overlooked.

This month's entries include

molecularmuse