Prevention of Medication Errors in Diabetic Patients in Home Health Services

How to Create Believable Characters in Short Stories

How to Create Believable Characters in Short Stories In the creation of a short story, one only has a very short window in which to convey the full range of a character. A short story is typically about five thousand words or less which is roughly about ten pages. Within those ten pages you need to be able show, not just the character but also the setting, plot, and the different scenarios leading up to the climax. How do you create a character in depth when you only have such a limited amount of words to do so with? By utilizing every single sentence you write to show things about the character. Don’t spend valuable words describing a character when you can show the character through dialogue and actions. Let’s say your heroine has long black hair. Saying that she has long black hair would describe her, but in a wasteful way since that statement does nothing but tell the reader that she has long black hair. Instead, why not show her impatiently pulling on her hair as the strands stubbornly coiled around her glistening arms like sinuous black snakes. With this second description, you’re not only telling the reader that she has long black hair but you’re also telling them that she’s in a hurry and is impatient with how her hair is sticking to her arms. Her arms are wet, could be raining or perhaps it’s sweat. The fact that strands of her hair are able to coil around her arms tells the reader that it’s pretty long. Long enough to tangle around her arms. Using black snakes as a symbolism not only tells the reader that she has blac k hair but also sets the stage for something suspenseful to happen. In a short story there’s only so many words to set the stage for climax so they need to be carefully chosen in order to convey multiple meanings. Make dialogue and attitude count for your character. Everything that’s said needs to show who and what the character is all about. Using a dialect can tell the reader where the character comes from. Create attitude for the character through how they talk. Use slang. If one is trying to show a nervous man, there’s no need to come straight out and say that he’s nervous and stammers a lot. Show it in his actions and the way he talks. Describe him looking down at his feet with hunched shoulders, trying to get a sentence out. Show him breaking up the words such as, â€Å"Sh†¦she, umm, she went over th†¦there, that way.† Have him push his glasses up on his nose with trembling fingers and tilt his head slightly to peer at the other person through his lens. These kinds of statements keep the story moving along while imparting a tremendous amount of information about this particular character. Immediately one starts to sympathize with this guy. The writer shows him either as a painfully nervous character or someone who is scared to death of something that’s happening or going to happen. It makes the reader want to keep going so they can find out exactly where the cause of his discomfort is coming from. Your goal as a short story writer is to create characters that are believable to the reader without them ever knowing that you’re telling them. Make it so that they feel as if they’re figuring it all out and picturing them in their minds. By doing so, you’ll carry the reader right along to the end of the tale.

The function and mechanism of AlkB Research Paper

The function and mechanism of AlkB - Research Paper Example Iron is known to interfere in the assays due to instability of AlkB/Fe+2 complexes in aerobic conditions; a problem that is overcome by replacing iron with other metals or performing assays under anaerobic conditions. The presence of iron bound to 2-oxoglutarate in the core of the enzyme has been established through over expression and isolation of native protein. Like all other Fe(II)/2-oxoglutarate-dependent dioxygenase superfamily enzymes AlkB too has a metal center exhibiting a UV-Vis band range of 52-580nm; that in absence of DNA is a five coordinate Fe2 center and changes to six coordinate center in presence of single stranded DNA. Like other members of the superfamily, AlkB too has a core jelly roll fold that is formed of 8 beta strands at the carboxy-terminus. The catalytic domain is contained within the carboxy-terminus; however additional features for substrate specificity lie outside the catalytic domain and the jelly roll fold. At the N-terminus additional beta strands an d alpha helices form a support scaffold for the catalytic domain and also the outer walls of Binding groove for DNA/RNA. In addition to these and many other structural similarities of AlkB to other members of Fe(II)/2-oxoglutarate-dependent dioxygenase superfamily; certain characteristics unique to AlkB include nucleotide binding lid, flipping mechanism motif. A common double stranded beta helix (DSBH) fold comprising of a large and a small beta sheet with iron core in between has the enzymes’ conserved residues. The first of the two distinct regions of DSBH includes a highly conserved iron binding region H131XD133XH187, wherein iron is bound to the 2-oxoglutarate in a bidentate form. The DSBH present the substrate binding site interacting exclusively with the damaged DNA/RNA strand through 2 amino terminal alpha helices and beta sheet loops that form a secondary structure called ‘lid’ (nucleotide recognition lid) over the active site. The flexible conformation o f the lid allows it its amino acids (Thr51, Tyr76 and Arg161) to bind to varied alkyl groups on its nucleotide substrates through H-bonding to phosphate group in the nucleotide backbone. As a consequence of this interaction the catalytic core of the AlkB, the enzyme loses its flexibility; undergoes a conformational change that disallows oxygen to reach the active site thereby preventing the oxidation of iron. It can thus be proposed that DNA binding if occurring after iron would lead to access of oxygen to active site. DNA/RNA repair mechanism of AlkB involves oxidative demethylation of nucleotides at the site of lesion which is accomplished through hydroxylation of methylated bases through oxidative decarboxylation of 2-oxoglutarate in the enzyme core. The latter as result is converted to succinate and CO2, and methyl group is released as formaldehyde. Though the actual mechanism is yet to be established, on the basis of studies on another enzyme of the same superfamily, TauD; the probable mechanism involving an oxidative intermediate to Trp178 has been proposed. The mechanism also verified through in vitro assays on purified AlkB involves the binding of Fe2 and 2-oxoglutarate to the enzyme core followed by binding of methylated middle base to the ‘lid’. This allows oxygen to reach the iron and form nucleophillic superoxo anion (OÂ ­2-) –Fe3. This then forms a bridged peroxo-type intermediate along with 2-oxoglutarate, that through decarboxylation of 2-oxoglutarate and cleavage of O2 forms Fe4-oxygen intermediate. Coupled to oxygen cleavage is formation of succinate and CO2 from 2-oxoglutarate. The intermediate on the other hand hydoxylates the methyl group at the nucleotide forming