This article really gets me thinking. I never really noticed the color change when cooking a lobster! Next time my mom cooks lobster (which she does in a cool way, she brings them home live) I will look at the coloring before and after. I do remember from past times, though, that the lobsters before had a sort of blue-black sheen and after they were a sort of bright red. Now that I actually know HOW it works, I might as well notice it. I give the article 8.5 out of 10 stars because although it got me thinking, I didn't understand some of the terms the author used. For example, I do not understand what the word astaxanthin (forgive me if I spelled it wrong) means (located in the 1st paragraph). I still thought it was really interesting and cool!
I think this article is very interesting. It is interesting how the red pigment molecules cross each other in a tight X formation. While the X formation alters the wavelengthes of light that is absorbed. And to think that heat changes the color! This was a good article and I learned a lot from it, although, it was a little confusing how in eachh paragraph they wrote the research changes. It was also interesting in this article how the red pigment molecules are grouped in pairs within the crustacynin. I always thought that lobsters were always red. I never new they were originally blue! If I were to draw a picture of a lobster, I would draw a red lobster. Now that I now lobsters are blue, I'll draw a blue lobster. It's amazing how color can change by just cooking you. I wonder if a human's skin would change to another color if you would cook the skin!
I found this article quite fascinating because I've watched my grandmother cook crabs that had the same color changing process. She would buy the crabs live and their shell would be a dull, dark green color. Then my grandma would fry the crab and the color would slowly turn to a bright red. I wondered if the crab I saw changed just like a lobster. Maybe it just looks the same, but is different. I did research and found that crabs also have astaxanthin in their shells, but not only do crabs have astaxanthin, so do flamingos, krill salmon, and shrimp! Free astaxanthin is red, but when binded to proteins found in a lobster's shell, it blends, and it also mixes the pigments together to create a new color. When you cook a lobster, you denature the protein through the heat which releases the pigment and turns the lobster red.
Albeit the limited length, I want to applaud NY Times for going into detail about this intriguing question. What I really find interesting is how heat changes and relaxes the bonds with beta-crustacyanin and astaxanthin. (Especially since astaxanthin is one of the /strongest/ antioxidants.) I believe crabs also turn red too when cooked (for they also have beta-crustacyanin). I know that these two are crustaceans, but I wonder if this pigment-phenomenon effects other animals too?
This idea gets you going. The fact that in the sea you cannot catch a red lobster can really throw you for a loop. The heat changing the color is actually very interesting because in cartoons and shows they say lobsters are red. I have to say that beta-crustacyanin is a cool thing to have. Next time I see a lobster at a dinner party, I certainly will think that the lobster was originally blue. Unless he is not cooked, in that case he will be blue.
I found this article very interesting. In 2002, scientists thought lobsters became red because of heat, but they really become red because of complex quantum-physics. Since, I keep Kosher I never really thought about what color lobster is. I always thought they were bright red in the ocean and cooked. I was wrong. It turns out there is a science on what color lobsters are. It is also cool to see how much science has developed over the years. In 2002, they thought something totally different from what they found today. It is amazing how much science has grown in the past 10 years.
This is super cool. I am very interested in new areas of science and about finding out more than the obvious solution, although sometimes, in other experiments, the obvious is correct. I really like learning about genetics and coloration and proteins.
7 comments:
This article really gets me thinking. I never really noticed the color change when cooking a lobster! Next time my mom cooks lobster (which she does in a cool way, she brings them home live) I will look at the coloring before and after. I do remember from past times, though, that the lobsters before had a sort of blue-black sheen and after they were a sort of bright red. Now that I actually know HOW it works, I might as well notice it. I give the article 8.5 out of 10 stars because although it got me thinking, I didn't understand some of the terms the author used. For example, I do not understand what the word astaxanthin (forgive me if I spelled it wrong) means (located in the 1st paragraph). I still thought it was really interesting and cool!
I think this article is very interesting. It is interesting how the red pigment molecules cross each other in a tight X formation. While the X formation alters the wavelengthes of light that is absorbed. And to think that heat changes the color! This was a good article and I learned a lot from it, although, it was a little confusing how in eachh paragraph they wrote the research changes. It was also interesting in this article how the red pigment molecules are grouped in pairs within the crustacynin. I always thought that lobsters were always red. I never new they were originally blue! If I were to draw a picture of a lobster, I would draw a red lobster. Now that I now lobsters are blue, I'll draw a blue lobster. It's amazing how color can change by just cooking you. I wonder if a human's skin would change to another color if you would cook the skin!
I found this article quite fascinating because I've watched my grandmother cook crabs that had the same color changing process. She would buy the crabs live and their shell would be a dull, dark green color. Then my grandma would fry the crab and the color would slowly turn to a bright red. I wondered if the crab I saw changed just like a lobster. Maybe it just looks the same, but is different. I did research and found that crabs also have astaxanthin in their shells, but not only do crabs have astaxanthin, so do flamingos, krill salmon, and shrimp! Free astaxanthin is red, but when binded to proteins found in a lobster's shell, it blends, and it also mixes the pigments together to create a new color. When you cook a lobster, you denature the protein through the heat which releases the pigment and turns the lobster red.
Albeit the limited length, I want to applaud NY Times for going into detail about this intriguing question. What I really find interesting is how heat changes and relaxes the bonds with beta-crustacyanin and astaxanthin. (Especially since astaxanthin is one of the /strongest/ antioxidants.) I believe crabs also turn red too when cooked (for they also have beta-crustacyanin). I know that these two are crustaceans, but I wonder if this pigment-phenomenon effects other animals too?
This idea gets you going. The fact that in the sea you cannot catch a red lobster can really throw you for a loop. The heat changing the color is actually very interesting because in cartoons and shows they say lobsters are red. I have to say that beta-crustacyanin is a cool thing to have. Next time I see a lobster at a dinner party, I certainly will think that the lobster was originally blue. Unless he is not cooked, in that case he will be blue.
I found this article very interesting. In 2002, scientists thought lobsters became red because of heat, but they really become red because of complex quantum-physics. Since, I keep Kosher I never really thought about what color lobster is. I always thought they were bright red in the ocean and cooked. I was wrong. It turns out there is a science on what color lobsters are. It is also cool to see how much science has developed over the years. In 2002, they thought something totally different from what they found today. It is amazing how much science has grown in the past 10 years.
This is super cool. I am very interested in new areas of science and about finding out more than the obvious solution, although sometimes, in other experiments, the obvious is correct. I really like learning about genetics and coloration and proteins.
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