A thousand of ways can be adopted to make your discovery be known. But this scientific tattoo sketched on the biochemistâs left shoulder is interesting. As she claims, this is a stylized structure of glycolipid A, a preformed glycolipid membrane precursor. Probably, if you donât like chemistry, this will not interest you.
This ‘tattoo’ was a great discovery of the biochemist 20 years ago when she was a graduate student. Perhaps it has become her way of always remembering what she discovered. In the field of chemistry, it is indeed an honor to be named as the author of the first precursor to be reported.
Twenty years back, the complex membrane proteins were anchored via glycolipids instead of transmembrane protein domains. Simplifying the structure will truly make you popular. But the biochemist said considerable artistic license has been taken with bond lengths and angles.
Such discovery of a chemical structure can only be created by geniuses. To inscribe it on your shoulder may be crazy to some but this pays off the hard work shown to discover it.
Source: Carl Zimmer