we scientists are not a creative bunch

[asimplechord]

But still! A little originality would be nice.

If I see one more newly sanctioned use of -ome, I'll scream.

Genome, proteome, proteasome, fine. Whatever.

Transcriptome? Meh.

Receptosome? *starts to frown*

Metallome? Oh, Tom O'Halloran, you get all the blame credit for that ridiculous thing.

NOBOnome? Lame.

And interactome? That is IT. NO MORE. I have decreed it. So must it be. In my little world, anyway.

And while we're at it? Ligand = noun. NOT A VERB. A small molecule doesn't ligand something; EDTA doesn't ligand a zinc or calcium ion. It ligates.

*twitch*

We now return to our regularly scheduled lab work.

Comments

[chiralove.livejournal.com]

*iz guilty of working on an -ome*

[asimplechord.livejournal.com]

*squinty eyes*

One of the aforementioned? Or an additional one? :)

[chiralove.livejournal.com]

... an additional one ... :)

[lilyeyes.livejournal.com]

*snickers* love the words people make up - just did our shift bidding for the next 4 months and had to determine who was 'bumpable' who could be displaced from their current shift by someone junior to them. bumpable ???

[asimplechord.livejournal.com]

Um, a junior person can bump a senior person? Is that for budgetary reasons?

[lilyeyes.livejournal.com]

No - in their infinate wisdom, it is thought this will keep someone from quitting because they can't get off graveyard shift. Everyone else does it strickly by senority - go figure!

[topaz7.livejournal.com]

Aren't there rules about wording things? Like -ase means it's an enzyme? I thought you science-y types were all about the rules.

I find this all very confusome.

[asimplechord.livejournal.com]

Enzyme have a naming and numbering system. Gene-naming is NOT systematic, and people who work in the Drosophila field go out of their way to make up crazy names. I mean, seriously, fuzzy onions as a gene name? hedgehog? Right.

The -ome thing is another thing where people started using it without rules, and it's gotten out of hand.

[angela-snape.livejournal.com]

I've always thought that nomenclature should have rules - it bothers me when most enzymes end in "ase", but then there's pepsin, trypsin, etc. that don't. Can't we just be consistent?

And some of those "ome"s?? Sound ridiculous.

[asimplechord.livejournal.com]

Those are just the ones I've heard recently. I hate them. The -ome seems to be used indiscriminately nowadays.

Is the trypsin/other peptidases naming convention a historical thing? They were named before rules had been decided?

[angela-snape.livejournal.com]

It's possible. I haven't looked into the history of biochemical naming or anything, but when I tell my students "ase" means enzyme in one breath and then introduce those peptidases (at least that ends in 'ase') I just say there are exceptions to every rule. *shrug*