Newsletter #31! Hydrolysis and dehydration!

  Water is really important. It’s really important in cooking too. It's good to know the chemistry to know what type of cooking you're trying to accomplish. (and this is just interesting...)

Hydrolysis and dehydration. These terms can be confusing. Hydro (water) lysis (splitting)… what’s splitting? The water? Yes. The other molecule splits? Yes. Is water released? No. However, in biology, when a cell goes through “lysis”, it spills open it’s liquidy-cytoplasm guts. This is cell-lysis, and water is released. This often confuses me!

“Dehydration reaction” is often called the opposite of hydrolysis. The term is also confusing, because if water is released, where’s all the water? Well, when you sautee food, there is a bit of boiling/bubbling/steam evaporating, although this is largely just water in the food leeching out and bubbling off. But you can think of some of this water/steam coming from the maillard reaction/dehydration reaction!

Water goes in… or water goes out!

Hydrolysis: Water goes in, and allows for splitting up into two molecules:

• i. Water goes in to break up two molecules: “Hydrolysis” examples (these take place in water, aka “aqueous reaction”)
1. Breaking down corn starch into corn syrup (with enzymes, acids and bases)
2. Breaking down peptide bonds (in protein) into amino acids
3. Digestion of everything you eat (with help from enzymes, acids, and bases), including hydrolysis of starches and disaccharides 
• a. Disaccharides are two sugars in one
• i. Sucrose and lactose are disaccharides 
• ii. Sucrose is glucose-fructose 
• iii. Lactose is glucose-galactose; folks who are lactose interolerant don’t any or sufficient of the enzyme lactase
• b. This is why it’s good to drink water with your meal!
  
  

Water comes out:

1. Example of two amino acids combining (dehydration reaction)

2.Maillard reaction releases a water molecule (dehydration) and produces a bigger molecule combining a reducing sugar and an amino acid, hence sauteing or baking produces nice browning and flavors, whereas boiling does not.

• ii. Water comes out to allow for combination of two molecules: Dehydration reaction examples
1. Maillard reaction (eg: black garlic!)
   
• a. Amino acid and reducing sugar when heated combine and release a water molecule; this dehydration reaction starts the “maillard reaction”, which described several reaction that occur during cooking 
2. Sugar Caramelization
3. Creation of polymers from smaller molecules sub-units (monomers): 
• a. “Dehydration synthesis” aka “Condensation Synthesis” 
• i. “condensation synthesis” can mean any molecule is released, not just water, so dehydration synthesis is a type of condensation synthesis
• ii. Condensation synthesis is especially important in plastics/polymer-chemistry and chemical engineering
4. Peptide bond formation from two amino acids combining: Bigger molecule, and water molecule released

Summary:

1. Hydrolysis (water goes in to break the bonds in a larger molecule and adds terminations to where the bond was broken, most often an -OH on one molecule termination and a Hydrogen termination on the other) FORMING TWO SMALLER MOLECULES

1. Dehydration/Condensation reactions: typically forms a larger molecule, aka “synthesis”, water comes out to make-way for a combination of two molecules coming together, most often, into one bigger molecule. Generally, either an -OH on one molecule departs and combines with a departing -H on the other molecule, or a departing =0xygen combines with a departing -H2.

Part 3 of what's new: More fresh batches of Heart and Liver of Beef treats!

 Bring your pup down for a free sample!