I ‘zinc’ therefore I am; The Mega Brainy

Isn’t it amazing how our brain is able to process several details? Like having to tackle several subjects in school at the same time, but still manage to excel in all the subjects that students are bombarded with. Weighing just 1.4 kilograms on average, it is mostly filled with 75% of water, yet it’s packed with an astounding 100 billion nerve cells, together with about 150000 kilometres of nerve fibres. This package as a result allows the brain to perform amazing things such as the ability to remember, imagine, react, and think. Although you might not have realised it, because of your amazing brain, you are a genius, regardless of your ability to identify what a skeletal diagram means, or what chemical structure is! Our chemistry tuition will let you realise this in the most comfortable manner, with the help of a few concepts of Medicinal Chemistry.

The function of Blood Brain Barrier (BBB)

More than a few 1000 years ago, when a blue dye was injected into the bloodstream of an animal, the tissues of the whole body turned blue except the brain and spinal cord. The mystery was solved when scientists discovered that it is the Blood-Brain Barrier which was preventing the materials in the blood from entering the brain. Just like how our chemistry tutor guides students slowly into getting into the concepts, while preventing incorrect and inaccurate information from getting to them, the blood brain barrier acts like a barrier between the bloodstream and the extracellular space of the brain. This is because it is complex and surrounds most of the blood vessels in the brain. As such, it only allows certain substances like small lipid-soluble substances, as well as water and oxygen to cross from the blood into the brain. This would prevent toxins and potentially dangerous pathogens from entering the brain. Moreover, it also protects the brain from hormones and neurotransmitters in the rest of the body, and helps to maintain a constant environment in the brain.

The use of Blood Brain Barrier (BBB)

Over the years, the blood brain barrier has been discovered to save lives, as well as behave as a therapeutic solution to several disorders. For example, getting drugs across the blood brain barrier could be important in contributing to develop successful therapies to treat central nervous system disorders. Some of such disorders include, Alzhemier;s disease, epilepsy and depression. Although still under investigation, our chemistry tutor can advise students on how this is done. In the current world where medical drugs and vaccines are becoming an integral part of our life, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic, chemistry tuition on the topic of Medicinal Chemistry is helpful to allow students to realise the medical use behind chemistry. This allows students to learn how things work in the scientific industry as well. “Wait Long; Strike Fast”- We would have heard our grandparents advise us. Despite how our brain makes us feel like moving ahead in life easily, it takes more than a year long to try to develop a drug relating to the central nervous systems. In addition to the long duration, the evolving mechanism of the brain makes it even more difficult to develop medical drugs efficiently. Hope this article as well as our chemistry tutor will spur students to become aspiring chemists, who can grow up to help further in the pharmaceutical industry and save many lives!

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