Redox redux: A response to feinman's “oxidation-reduction calculations in the biochemistry course” (Biochem. Mol. Biol. Educ. 32, 161–166)

✍ Scribed by Todd Silverstein

• Publisher: The American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology
• Year: 2005
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 37 KB
• Volume: 33
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 1470-8175
• DOI: 10.1002/bmb.2005.49403304252

✦ Synopsis

Abstract

In a recent article, Richard Feinman suggested that we teach students to perform redox calculations in biochemistry by using the European rather than the American convention. In this article I raise a few objections (and correct a few errors). First, it's not clear that the European convention is any easier to use than the American. Second, students have already learned the American convention in freshman chemistry; why teach them a different method as upperclassmen? Last, by teaching a different problem‐solving method in biochemistry than the one they learned in Introductory Chemistry, we lose an opportunity to show students how principles from “regular” chemistry apply to biological systems.