Why Some Molecules Have Evil Twins
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- Опубліковано 26 січ 2025
- A tiny change in a molecule’s geometry completely changes its effects on the human body.
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To learn more about this topic, start your googling with these keywords:
Enantiomers: Molecules that are mirror images of each other.
Chirality: A geometric property that makes a molecule non-superimposable on its mirror image.
Methamphetamine: A central nervous system stimulant.
Levmetamfetamine: The new name for the left-handed version of methamphetamine, which acts as a vasoconstrictor.
Carvone: A terpenoid found in many essential oils.
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Script Writer: David Goldenberg
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REFERENCES
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Lodish H, Berk A, Zipursky SL., et al. “The Making or Breaking of Covalent Bonds Involves Large Energy Changes”. Molecular Cell Biology. Section 2:1 (22). Retrieved from: www.ncbi.nlm.n...
Wallach, J. “A Comprehensive Guide to the Clandestine Chemistry of 'Breaking Bad'”
Vice. (2013). Retrieved from: motherboard.vi....
Thanks to the following experts for their input and feedback:
Jason Wallach, Vice writer and chemist
Donna Nelson, University of Oklahoma chemistry professor and technical advisor to ‘Breaking Bad’
Adam Braunschweig, CUNY chemistry professor (www.braunschwei...)
Justin Dragna, University of Texas chemistry professor
You could also compare them to Tetris pieces
The Squiggly and Reverse Squiggly are NOT the same block and they do NOT fit into the same shape holes
same with L block and J block
This one works much better, but also ignores the 3 pesky dimensions.
Yes. Super monkey ball banana blitz HD.
Same with S and Z
@@zenith_tetris thats waht he is talking about
1:32 Are you saying that licorice is evil mint?... or is mint evil licorice?
Rekalty mint and licorice both aren't evil.
well maybe licorice would be the evil one..since that licorice itself. well causes high blood pressure. (no problem tho with your American fake black licorice. doesn't smell nor taste like the real stuff)
Liquorice is Evil
Come to the darkside, we have delicious licorice. Jedi only have peppermint
so, is it only me who thinks liquorice and mint kind of smell the same? like, not equal, but very similar...
Someone knows how to ask the REAL questions.
Luckily it's been long enough since I took O-chem that I am no longer triggered by the thought of enantiomers.
It's Okay To Be Smart
Hello
*triggered*
I don't think it's triggered so much as PTSD
Oh my god I am subscribed to you and Minute Earth
Uhm... why don't we simply rotate the molecules along the vertical axis- oh, I suppose they aren't planar, right?
Exactly, like if you did that to your left hand, it still wouldn't be your right hand; the fingers would bend the wrong way and all the fingernails would be on the wrong side :)
This video was a weird approach to chirality. It doesn't leave people with much actual knowledge.
It wasn't really here to explain what chirality actually is, rather that "it exists and these are its effects", kind of like how magnetism is explained until you get to university, but I get what you mean
Well, tbh I went to university. They explained all the sorts of magnetism and the causes at the electron spin level. However, I still don't know how it works and I claim very few, if any, actually do. But I get what you mean. Even though I think it would be possible to do a 5 minute run down on chirality without to much need of explaining orbitals. However, explaining chemical bonding might actually be a good video topic as well.
They should have made it more explicit, that just like right hand vs. left hand or clockwise vs counter clockwise screw, no amount of rotation or twisting will make them identical.
When your edgy brother tries to be different...
10,000 Subscribers without Videos new sub
Ps cool pic
*ItS nOt A pHaSe MoM!!!*
James Burgess pfft
James Burgess, like the wolf picture
Oliwia Morawska, liking yours too
The worst example of this was thalidomide. The intended molecule was a very effective treatment for morning sickness, but its chiral counterpart caused the unborn child to develop deformities. It's the textbook example as to why drugs have to be so pure, and racemic (mixture of enantiomers) doses are usually unacceptable.
Wasn't the problem with thalidomide also that the body could _convert_ the two enantiomers into each other, meaning even if it were administered as the enantiopure drug, it'd quickly turn into the racemic mixture in the body, causing issues regardless?
@@SaraWolffs Yes it is. That's why purified chiral drug won't work on thalidomide. The chemist already knew how to make it but it's useless since it converts in the body.
@@SaraWolffs Exactly correct
Thats not true at all, the majority of drugs you take are racemic. There can be benefits (sometimes major, sometimes minor) to making an enantiomerically pure product but often it's simply not worth the added cost
@@alexrogers777 Yep as long as the other molecule don't cause trouble they can stay in the medicine. Just use more of them to compensate for impurity weight.
I'm surprised you didn't mention the most famous chirality accident of all time - thalidomide, which was distributed as a morning sickness drug (but which had an enantiomer which caused birth defects.)
had that in school
This was the same example used in Breaking Bad when walt was teaching chirality.
Thalidomide isn't quite a chirality accident. Regardless of which enantiomer is administered, it becomes racemized in vivo, so while yes the two enantiomers have different effects, they effectively don't since even a pure sample of one will be turned into a racemic mixture of both.
@@lorscarbonferrite6964 Why is it possible for thalidomide to be racemized but not nasal spray?
@@Anonymous-df8it Biochemistry is complicated, and different drugs will participate in different chemical reactions in vivo. Racemization is just one specific kind of chemical reaction, so it shouldn't really be that surprising that some drugs will undergo it and some won't.
"I'm gonna try making meth from nasal spray"
"did it work?"
"no, but I'm breathing great now"
You probably could but that's illegal as hell and you don't want to get addicted lol
0:32 Crazy Hand lol
Anson Chan
Lol
Crazy Hand is a left hand tho.
If only they knew, we would have a flawless joke. :(
DFTBA! wristband!
Don't worry I'm good at this I'll kill him
+Aditya Khanna i always forgot what DFTBA stands for......pls let me know....
2:15 **awkward silence*
Probably talking about the captions, and how they display early.
yep
It's to let the pun sink in. Because it was subtle. So it needs time. To sink in. Properly.
Every minute earth and minute physics video must contain a cringeworthy bad pun. It is a physical law of nature.
*HEY ITS KATE*
Breaking Bad already taught me all of that.
no it didn't
Pretty sure in the pilot episode Walter White explains it to his students. Although, he didn't use the same example
Breaking buck
Exactly! They're chiral I believe he said
Jesse, we need to cook nasal spray
breaking bad theme plays
Lol
Fixing good* @@astriel404
Great visuals at 0:47 and 1:36
ok
agreed, it was really simple to understand!
To all those saying just flip the molecule around to be the same as the other mirror molecule, that wouldn't quite work because the stereochemistry of the methyl next to the amine group (the dashed line) goes in an opposite direction when you mirror the molecule, thus making the molecule different.
I've cut apart the whole cotton from an inhaler and ate it... The high was alright, I guess. Couldn't sleep for a day. Not that great of a high but it's a high..
what
Mystic rythems under citylights what
Levmethamfetamine can be abused to achieve a recreational high. The vicks vapor inhaler can be broken open to expose a piece of cotton that has the chemical soaked in there
This reminds me of the countless hours trying to separate the two so we can get an enantiopure solution in organic chemistry lab.... #tears
you again...
got some channels to recommend? you seem to be interested in a lot of good channels.
I have a list of my favorites on the "recommended" part of my channel. Otherwise they are the usual suspects that we all know and love.
There's a lack of cool medical channels so I'm going to fill that void.
wait... you do awesome videos too?!?
Turun Ambartanen welcome aboard :) , working on one at the moment, should be fun.
Dr.StickFigure o
We need more videos with Ever. He's amazing
Looks like my chemistry education did teach me something after all. At 0:24 I immediately went "Oh, optical isomers, those can be distinguished in a polarimeter and they have different properties" and the next second "People will probably think I have no life..."
You must be a nerd, or better... nerdfighter. DFTBA!!!
DFTBA! Don't forget to decrease world suck!
boilpoil yaaa! Go nerdfighters! DFTBA! I love those two...
"Wow I'm so smart!"
boilpoil why people would think you have no life ? Isnt that awesome you have the knowledge to know that ? People who dont know that should be somewhat ashamed
"Molecules Have Evil Twins"
Let's reverse that
"Molecules Evil Twins Have"
Short for M.E.T.H
Is this a secret message???
no “sniwT livE evaH seluceloM” is not short for meth stupid
@@geomochi4904 do you are have stupid
@@kirbycreep ?diputs evah era uoy od
@@Hydrastic-bz5qm You just said "do you are have stupid" backwards
That's not what reversing means...
Evil Walter White be like: "JESSE WE NEED TO MAKE NASAL SPRAY JESSE."
What i was thinking too, looks just like the blue sky stuff
all through my chemistry in school, I never understood why left and right molecules had different properties, I always thought that flipping the left would make its right counter-part, this video explained why that isnt possible in just 2 minutes, 2 minutes of this video > years of chemistry class in school
"Jesse i got into a minute earth video"
you didnt even awnser the question in the title
Answer: Because the molecular bonds work in both ways.
Done.
+koplerio Your answer doesn't really make any sense. The reason why they have "evil" twins is because even with the same set of molecules, you can have different configurations. And in our 3D world, mirrored molecules cannot be transformed to its mirrored twin by rotation.
I also noticed that and I knew it before I clicked the video because how can there be a "reason" there is no reason other than that they just are. Annoying!
Molecules simply exist. just like matter simply exists. and when you have a lot of molecules that are randomly put together you will have some that are exactly mirror images*. these mirror molecules cannot be easily transformed in their twin molecule and sometimes have completely different biological properites. one can be beneficial, the other one causes harm. this might not always be the case though.
*you need one atom with 4 covalent bonds that all differ in their substructure.
These chiral molecules have a mirrored arrangement of their molecules in 3D space. While these enantiomers, as they are called, have similar physical properties, when reacting in another chiral environment they will react differently. Biological systems are chiral environments, As we only produce one enantiomer of molecules. this causes other enantiomers to react differently, as was shown with the glove example and the meth example. due to the mirrored arrangement of the atoms, they stimulate different chiral receptors, and can affect our bodies differently.
I love nasal inhalers (the mint smell jump starts my brain when I'm sleepy) so much so that my friend said I sound like I'm an addict. I'm very excited to tell her that her description may not be SO far off xD Thanks for the knowledge! I love UA-cam educational videos
what did they say?
we never knew what they said
“Hello? Yes I would like to order 10 carbon atoms, 15 hydrogen atoms, and 1 Nitrogen atom please.”
Oh hey i'm just a nerd that wanted to study chemicals.
Can we do something together.
"FBI OPEN UP!"
iiiii i gotta go..
No mention of the classic example of Thalidomide?
Surprised this comment doesn’t have any likes nor comments :(
It's much easier to start from scratch than it is to convert most chiral chemicals to their opposite enantiomers.
Indeed
I really think they should have explained the stereo notation right at the start of the video, I can see how a lay person would've been quite confused with the notation being used without even any attempt at an explanation until quite far into the video. Even then it only got a small foot note which it looks like a lot of people missed...
Amphetamines have a levo and dextro structure and both are active in the same one, but one is more efficient.
why right handy is evil, it always beats me when its angry about the things my left hand did
wow
It's even weirder in the Italian language, where right hand is called Mano Destra, and left hand is Mano Sinistra.
0:36 "Right hand in right-hand glove, left hand in left-hand glove"
*Proceeds to put on gloves that fit either hand*
0:42 Despite what he says, I still manage to fit my left hand glove onto my right hand 90% of the time.
The thumbnail looks like a movie character realizing through a reflective surface he was the villian the entire time
L-sucrose is just like sucrose, except it's as rare as gold, doesn't digest, and acts as a powerful laxative.
Adam Smith
Haribo Gummi Bears?
No those are made of sugar alcohols.
Which one though, I don't what kill my dog. L-sucrose is good for mad cow disease
my butt before an event
My right hand also give me the sensation of euphoria and excitement.
haha I see what you did there
0:17 finally, now I can make meth
Frrr
Mr white
This is the moment when minuteEarth become heisenberg
Are there any enantiomers where both versions have positive, but different, effects, or both negative?
angeldude101 probably, because there's no reason for two enantiomers to be positive/negative. I think an example are the enantiomers escitalopram and citalopram, whose effects are pretty similar.
angeldude101 they are both used against major depressions I may add.
This video had an example.
Well, the thing is that with neuropharmacology it's not often as simple as good and bad effects. Drugs can be helpful or harmful in different doses and in different circumstances. D-Meth can be safe and useful in the right circumstances, but habitual use or use in large quantities can be dangerous. L-Meth is useful as a nasal spray, which D-meth could be as well if it wasn't illegal, but lacks the pleasant central nervous system effects, which is probably better for normal use as a nasal spray but is useless as a stimulant or recreational drug. Drugs are tools, and are not good or bad but merely suitable or unsuitable for a given job or circumstance.
Larry Psuedonym Such is medicine. The ban on the drugs was dropping hints that people are being imbeciles with their use if political/influential factors are isolated and controlled.
NileRed next month: Turning nasal spray into meth
me wearing my right and left gloves on the opposite hands by wearing them backwards
Ironically this is just like the mirror personality of Walter white and Heisenberg, ever what he was teaching in an episode
1:09 the question is can d-penicillamine can bind to l-penicillamine
Idk, probably
Minute Earth I have been subscribed to your channel for over a year now and I love your videos and so does my mom. Your videos are really educational and I learn a lot.
they're also both just as deadly in overdose.
Every overdose can kill. But the difference is how *fast* they do
They both have pretty much identical lethal doses and kill through peripheral overstimulation
They should have different LD50 as they act on different routes.
in acute overdose both kill through peripheral nervous system overstimulation, action at the adrenergic receptor sites which both have equal affinity for, dexmethamphetamine is actually just as good a decongestant as levomethamphetamine, it's just got dopaminergic stimulant effects which make it undesirable for over the counter consumption. racemic amphetamine was sold as a decongestant before stereospecific syntheses were worked out for them and it had the added bonus of giving people the energy to keep working through their respiratory illness.
I see.Thanks for the info. Do you have source on it? I wanna to read more.
A very law abiding instructive and informative way to teach
Meth isn't exactly 'extremely dangerous' unless you abuse it.
Medically useful doses of meth (single digit milligram sort of scale) have one main serious side effect, which is that they are seratonergic, but this is primarily a long-term effect.
other than that, the behavior of "evil" meth in the body is extremely similar to a more potent version of amphetamine. i.e. Adderall.
There isn't ANY dose of meth causing chemical addiction. That's like caffeine causing chemical addiction.
How are the serotonergic effects negative? Lot's of very safe drugs like psychedelics and relatively safe drugs like MDMA have serotonergic effects, it seems to me like the adrenergic and to a lesser extent noradrenergic effects would be dangerous long before you got to doses where serotonin syndrome comes into play. But I'm relatively new to chemistry and neuropharmacology, so please enlighten me if I'm wrong.
you can be addictedd to caffeine
I believe sucrose and sucralose are two more examples of mirror molecules.
Chemicals aren't inherently evil, meth when used appropriately can be a powerful cognitive enhancer. Just because people get a hold of it and abuse it does not mean the chemical is evil. Say "know" to drugs.
yes
Ay Bo0o0o0oSs know.
I'm not talking to any drugs! Thank you, sir.
Ay Bo0o0o0oSs wrong, salt is very evil. It always looks at me funny.
triggered.
Hi minute earth!! You guys are my favourite channel and I watch you all the time. I just wanted to ask you two questions:
1)why is air transparent?
2)why don't you post videos more often?
Thanks!
You did not answer the title of the video.
hi
no it’s goodbye
I am completely new...first time here..I thought this was from MinutePhysics...well..no problema
2:01 r/chemistrycreepypasta
This is not reddit
If the tetrahedral carbon atom is what is preventing these two molecules from being the same molecule when flipped, does that imply planar molecules have no enantiomers?
no. draw a triangle with a curved line hanging off one point. flip it over, and the curve is reversed, but only visually. from the triangles point of view, its still curved the same way as always.
👨🏻🏫 As a school student I found much science very challenging, but this channel is very understandable for me😃🏛🇬🇧
Many things I have learnt from this channel!
Science education is ass. If you want to learn real science, you’ve gotta come to the internet and watch channels such as this one, scishow, it’s okay to be smart, veritasium, vsauce, etc. Another viable option are podcasts. HowStuffWorks has an excellent network of fascinating podcasts, some scientific, some focussed on other things. Still incredible nonetheless.
So if I am able to rotate anything in the 4th dimension… it’s dangerous?
This is why you dont say
"Aww man i wish i had a twin!"
No offense
Your twin might be evil
Or edgy
I don't see a difference between the two; And no, not the twins
Love the promotion for the March for Science! Thank you!
You know what's more dangerous than Meth?
MATH
Which actually caused meth.
Math is ez..chemistry on the other hand
tee hee math hard
this gun did not just hit us with a pun at the end
It's sad how few videos they make and how short they are
The Waste of the Ocean Its hard to videos like this
They did a bad job on this one, though. No such thing as an evil molecule, lol, not even meth.
I disagree; I think they're short and to the point, and well-produced.
HOW SHORT? The channel is literally called "MinuteEarth". But yes, more would be awesome.
Spectrei for once I checked my notifications and saw these, I love their videos so I wish they had more
You can convert those chemicals easily if you can flip things in 4D space
Perfect description to chirality... wait a MinuteEarth! 0:32 sneaky DFTBA promotions!
*But how they know what is left and right if direction there's no direction in space?*
the depiction is just a drawing, a representation.
what is happening at the atomic level is based on valency, bonds, inter-atomic forces...
Chirality of the enantiomers...I remember that from BrBa
At what point in the series was chirality of methamphetamine mentioned?
Actually, the chirality of thalidomide, not methamphetamine, is in the second episode, "Cat's in the Bag," during a high school chemistry class (taught by Walter White/Bryan Cranston)
So if I put my congestion medicine by a mirror, the stuff on the other side is actually meth?
Okay, I know that's not how things work. But if you were to geometrically mirror the decongestant, you'd get the meth.
This guy has a strange sounding accent. What a worldly and diverse channel wow
James Cockerham It isn't that strange. It sounds like a standard Latin accent.
Sounds like a standard Latin language too. Can hardly understand.
Do you mean a SPANISH accent? I doubt there are many ppl who speak latin as a first language, causing their English to sound strange.
Its romanian.
a latin accent obviously refers to accents coming from latin languages, obviously no one natively speaks latin
Gotta love this guy's accent. Does he speaks spanish?
I love Ever's voice so much, he should be in more videos.
Is just me, or he did a really good accent?
What happens when you take both penicillamines
chaos
A video on enantiomers without mentioning thalidomide!! It's a welcome relief.
I remember this analogy from breaking bad
wow it took me 3 days of google searching to find this video again after it popped up in my head
The same thing happened to me but it was garlic bread 🧄🍞 1:28
Couldn't find any actual left or right-handed gloves?
The narrator's accent is perfectly intelligible. You might not believe it, but there are people who don't speak English with a North American, British, or Australian accent whom nevertheless you can learn things from. Shocking, I know.
No it's not. It's hard to grasp, almost annoying.
Also, I don't speak English with a North American, British, Australian, New Zealand, South African or any other such accent. I also don't narrate science videos.
good thing there's subtitles, huh?
"perfectly intelligible" that claim is factually false. It is possible to understand him certainly, but the fact there is a detectable accent at all means it isn't "perfectly intelligible". And yes, a British accent isn't "perfectly intelligible" either, but it's a matter of degree. To the vast majority of English speakers (aka the video's audience), a British accent is far more intelligible than the accent in this video.
Does it work this way? Yes. Is it a detriment to the video? Also yes.
What are you even talking about? If the phonemic replacements are predictable and the grammar is correct, then yes, it's perfectly intelligible. You're acting like there's one "true" form of spoken English, like language itself is even that simple. Language is organic. Your brain is organic too. Use it.
Maybe you should listen to yourself. Language is organic: YES. Language itself is not that simple: YES. THAT IS WHY NOTHING ANYWHERE CAN BE PERFECTLY INTELLIGIBLE. It's all a sliding scale, which is my point. Individual things will be more or less intelligible depending on the listener. Now in that scale, which is CLOSER to being perfectly legible: the narrator in this video, or someone with an American, British, or Australian accent?
imagine if humans just had a check engine light when you had to go to the doctor
"lefvt handed gloev"
Amazing accent.
You have to rotate them in the 4th dimension to make them look the same, just like a flat shape and its reflection can’t be flipped to look like itself or vice versa
Your right hand can't be evil. Everyone knows that evil comes from the sinister hand.
Gee. I didn't know you hate lefties
Just had a biochem exam with this material on it! 👍🏻
Soo... the right hand I evil now?
That description of chirality was so elegant!
yo i got that nasal spray
the video does surprisingly little to answer the question in the title. good job!
JESSE
its usually easier to assemble a molecule from "scratch" (other smaller molecules) than to "flip" it into its evil twin, right?
There's no such thing as an evil molecule. d-methamphetamine (AKA desoxyn) is used as a medicine for ADHD patients. Just because something can get you high doesn't make it evil. And just because you want to get high doesn't make you evil either.
this is too hard for people to understand
Been telling people for years about 'metamfetamine' but nobody ever believes me until I show them some Vicks inhalers.
But that's claiming that a natural substance is evil, which is ridiculous
Ever you're the molecular guy on minuteEarth.
I usually like your videos a lot, but this is a rather poor explanation of chirality, and I find the statement that some molecules are inherently "evil" distasteful.
"Ferb, I know what we should do today."
This doesnt explain why...
I think it does so quite clearly, though?
A few people have said they only understood chirality because they've studied chemistry. I only understood because I watched Vi Hart's Hexaflexagon videos.
Vi hart !!! Yes !!!
i understand chirality from too long spent machining left and right hand threads...
i find it rather difficult to understand this guys accent without concentrating.
Toxic Don Captions
Toxic Don you shouldn't go to college then
I don't. :) Understood him perfectly, no trouble.
I didn't really have any problems understanding him, but I can see why others might have trouble with it. Even so, I think this is fine since you can turn on captions, and it's not really his fault that he has an accent ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
You need to give more attention = you learn more from the video
I love the way he says “glove”
Legalize and regulate all drugs!!!
No!
groszak1 Yes! we have to many people in prision and people keep doing drugs, this system isnt working.
It's sad that until I came along groszak1 had more upvotes than you. Unfortunately, society is far from seeing the truth about drugs. Keep doing your thing, man, and be careful. Those who would seek to harm you for exploring your mind are everywhere, but luckily the space in which your exploration occurs is hidden to them, for now.
Don't forget taxing it high to remind people who let them take responsibility with those chemicals.
They've been doing that for years......
"who can't get their chemistry RIGHT" - I see what you did there! Of all the MinuteEarth puns, this is one of the best :)
In the comment section you will find:
*Breaking bad refrences.
*People saying that the video does not answer the question.
*People being annoyed by the guy's accent.
*Comments about right and left hands.
*Early comment.
*Actual useful comments like this one.
i scrolled down from this comment and the ones below are what you've said. Good job.
Your comment isnt useful in any way.
it really didn't answer the question. it didn't say why the left vs right handed matters
How is this a useful comment?
It’s just more clutter
Omer Magen along with people saying that "there is no such thing as an evil chemical"
Finally, a MinuteEarth video that isn't accusing humans of jacking up the planet.