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Ch. 5 - The Structure and Function of Large Biological Molecules

Chapter 5, Problem 3

Which of the following is true of unsaturated fats? a. They are more common in animals than in plants. b. They have double bonds in their fatty acid chains. c. They generally solidify at room temperature. d. They contain more hydrogen than do saturated fats having the same number of carbon atoms.

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Welcome back. The next problem is all of the following are characteristics of unsaturated fats. Except that Except reminds us that we're looking for a false answer about unsaturated fats. So the first thing we want to think about is what is an unsaturated fat. A fat being a molecule of glycerol bonded to three long chain fatty acids. And if we look at the structure of these long chains, we see that an unsaturated fatty acid chain has at least one double bond between two of the carbons here. That double bond creates a sort of kink in that chain structure. Whereas a saturated fatty acid has all single bonds between all its carbons with hydrogen bonded in all available spaces, it's saturated with the highest possible number of hydrogen. So that said, it's always good in multiple choice questions to look over your answers quickly and see if anything jumps out at you as obvious, obviously correct or obviously when you can throw out. So looking at these choices A. They originate in plants mainly B. They are liquid at room temperature. C. They contain saturated fatty acids or D. They are health friendly. Is there anything here that jumps out at you as something obvious. Well, from looking at these diagrams here, we see that unsaturated and saturated by the acids are contradictory or opposite ideas. So that lets us know that choice C must be false and therefore is most likely our correct answer. If we want to double check, we'll just look quickly at our other options. A. They originate in plants mainly. That is true. Unsaturated fats are mainly plant at bats where saturated fats are from animals. They are liquid at room temperature. That's also true. This kink in the chain structure means they can't pack tightly together like saturated fats, which makes those solid and D their health friendly. That is also true. Unsaturated fats being healthier than saturated fats. So that confirms that indeed our correct choice is C. They contain saturated fatty acids. Thanks for listening to have you again for the next video.