For the following article, \" A Bacterium That Can Grow by Using Arsenic Instead
ID: 141204 • Letter: F
Question
For the following article, "A Bacterium That Can Grow by Using Arsenic Instead of Phosphorus Felisa Wolfe-Simon, et al. " http://science.sciencemag.org/content/332/6034/1163
Determine the most important figure and explain why it is the most important. Do not answer the following for the entire paper, it has to be specific for the most important figure chosen. Thank you so much!!!
For the most important figure, explain the following in detail: Question/Hypothesis, Techniques Used, Controls, and Author’s Conclusions
Explanation / Answer
Answer: Living things are largely made from compounds that include the elements carbon, oxygen, nitrogen, and hydrogen but there are other smaller amounts of elements supporting living system such as phosphorus and sulfur which were also present in traces amount. These elements make proteins, nucleic acid, carbohydrates, lipids, and vitamins. However, In some species absence of this abundant element have great evolutionary and geochemical importance. A bacterium strain of California, as GFAJ-1 isolated from a mono lake, contains arsenic in place of phosphorus as a major bio-element.
In the article "A Bacterium That Can Grow by Using Arsenic Instead of Phosphorus" all figures are important and provides the strongest evidence for the substitution of arsenic for phosphorus. Among other diagrams, "figure 3" is most important because it helps us to know about the characterization of the intracellular arsenic in the biological environment. X-ray and NanoSIMS results indicate the complex compounds and their coordinated structures and show strong evidence of arsenic to be an intracellular component and incorporated into key biomolecules such as in nucleic acid (DNA).