From The Guardian ...
"It sounds like the breakthrough that no one was asking for: scientists have announced they have managed to “unboil” an egg. In a disgusting-sounding experiment that you probably shouldn’t try at home, an international team of researchers have used urea, one of the main components of urine, and a “vortex fluid device” to uncook a hen’s egg. They believe the findings could dramatically reduce costs in processes as far apart as cheese manufacturing and cancer research."
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Scientists Discover way to Unboil an Egg
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(Score: 5, Informative) by MrGuy on Wednesday January 28 2015, @02:56PM
"Unboil" would mean to return something to it's pre-boiling state. That's not really what they did here. But what they did is still pretty important.
When you boil an egg, one of the key things that happen is that the many, many proteins inside the egg denature (change structure), which is also why the egg hardens. Denaturing a protein is generally very hard to reverse.
What they've found is a way to reasonably cheaply cause at least ONE of the proteins in egg whites to reverse this denaturing - untangle the protein post-boiling and allow it to refold in it's original state, by a combination of re-liquifying the protein, and then using careful spinning to pull them apart and given them a chance to re-fold in the original manner.
That's actually pretty cool - one huge challenge in working with proteins (especially enzymes) is that if you get them over some critical temperature, they denature and are basically useless forever. Being able to reverse that process in a feasibly cost-effective way is potentially a highly useful thing to be able to do.
(Score: 3, Informative) by sudo rm -rf on Wednesday January 28 2015, @02:58PM
Here's the full research paper [wiley.com].
Anyway, this sounds like a fun experiment for long winter evenings, why shouldn't I do it? Is it because the mysterious "vortex fluid device" won't work without a finger-longer?
(Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday January 28 2015, @03:16PM
Looks achievable, only 5000 RPM for 5 minutes in a little tube. Not like you'll need a 2 acre chemical plant an a steamfitter to try it at home.
I wonder what the molecular gastronomy types could do in the kitchen with an unboiled egg. I guess you could make something like pasteurized mayonnaise at home, by boiling the egg into sanitation for 10 minutes or whatever, then chemically unboiling it and turning it into mayo, which is mildly interesting. There's a couple sauces where if you F up and add too much egg at once (not tempering it by gradual intermixing of boiling sauce and raw egg) then you get scrambled eggs instead of a thickened sauce, maybe you could save a screwed up sauce this way.
A cooked egg is just cooked protein, an egg is basically "meat". So you can uncook meat. Looking at the negative applications, maybe it'll be a new way to sanitize pink slime. Because cheap food needs more slime.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 28 2015, @03:39PM
I'm not sure the taste and smell of urea would be very welcome in gastronomy.
(Score: 3, Funny) by tibman on Wednesday January 28 2015, @04:05PM
I don't recommend the lobster bisque then.
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(Score: 3, Interesting) by VLM on Wednesday January 28 2015, @04:52PM
I think its tasteless and odorless, and the primary component of urine is water not urea. Its the primary organic/biological component unless theres something wrong with your innards (like you're peeing sugar because you're diabetic)
I don't think it can kill someone with functioning kidneys as long as they drink enough water, like the LD50 is like a tenth the body weight of a rat or something. Its like water intoxication death, you can do it but it takes a heck of a lot of work.
This is a gross simplification but its pretty much condensed carbon dioxide and ammonia. Its the "exhaust" of protein synthesis, or is the tail of an amino acid, kinda sorta.
The Chinese are really good at turning it into melamine, which your body does not much appreciate. The Chinese are so good at it, in their typically centrally controlled way, that they have a ridiculous surplus of melamine, and simple way to get rid of it is mix it into food which boosts the simplistic protein analysis (because it is the tail of amino acids, so it chemically looks like protein). Of course that kills most mammals that eat it, but thats not the Chinese exporters problem. You have to do some strange chemical plant BS to make melamine out of urea involving high pressures and catalysts and high temp and time, so the odds of molecular gastronomy types killing people by inadvertent mfgr of melamine is pretty low.
I don't think you can use urea as a food adulterant to boost protein analysis because some soil bacteria think its the best tasting thing ever. Maybe thats the key, make something like those stinky cheeses and vinegars using a re-unboiled egg.
I'm having trouble thinking of a cooking application for urea. Makes a heck of a good wood finish when polymerized and otherwise messed with, and makes a great nitrogen fertilizer, and makes a tolerably good polymerized plastic, but WRT cooking I'm at a loss, it won't make you sick but it won't do anything cool in the kitchen..
I guess it makes a decent protein denaturant... maybe you could throw raw pork and re-unboiled egg into a pan and rely on the excess urea to cure the raw pork into ham, although why the heck you'd want to do that is a mystery (why not make an omelet using regular ham and un messed with eggs?)
(Score: 2) by hubie on Wednesday January 28 2015, @06:39PM
It does bring to mind a humorous scene in The War of the Roses involving Michael Douglas. The punch line was: A family tiff seems to be developing. I don't know if we should leave, but I definitely advise skipping the fish course.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday January 28 2015, @04:23PM
Strangely, pink slime is hands down the most nutritious thing in a meat packing plant. Those who refuse to use it based on a silly name are cheating themselves out of a better diet.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by pogostix on Wednesday January 28 2015, @04:37PM
Isn't it guts rinsed in ammonia?
(Score: 3, Informative) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday January 28 2015, @07:50PM
No, it's the name given to what's left in machines like the hamburger grinder after the processing is done.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 28 2015, @03:27PM
Way behind that other site.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday January 28 2015, @04:25PM
Submit faster then.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by gnuman on Wednesday January 28 2015, @04:38PM
But the comments are better :P
(Score: 2) by Bot on Wednesday January 28 2015, @07:35PM
Soylent was the very first to cover the story, but, sadly, an accidental triggering of the vortex fluid device unposted it.
Account abandoned.
(Score: 2) by LoRdTAW on Wednesday January 28 2015, @07:36PM
Is there any reason that non-critical (critical meaning major events like catastrophes) news must be reported in real time? What are you losing besides a false sense of superiority in knowing that you got the news first? If you read it on the other site then good for you. If you'd like to discuss it again then feel free to do so. Otherwise please move along.
Honestly, I don't give a damn if it's days or even weeks old. If its worth reporting, then report it. We can then discuss it at our leisure.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 29 2015, @12:26AM
I peruse both sites, each has advantages. It gets boring seeing the same story cross posted, sometimes by the same poster.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 29 2015, @01:46AM
Who cares? I don't come here for breaking news anyhow.
(Score: 3, Funny) by ikanreed on Wednesday January 28 2015, @03:43PM
I was passing over this as not-particular interesting outside of the research applications.
Then I realized.
You can boil an egg to make it safe to eat, then unboil it(not resurrecting bacteria) and use it to make cookiedough. Cookie dough with no risk of salmonella. I'm sold.
(Score: 2) by pkrasimirov on Wednesday January 28 2015, @04:36PM
Yes but with piss.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday January 28 2015, @08:18PM
Dehydrated cow piss is in every bottle of beer/wine/cider you've ever drank. It's used as yeast nutrient.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 28 2015, @04:55PM
Or if that proves too hard at least untoast the slices of bread! Soon we'll have an entire unbreakfast!
(Score: 2) by shortscreen on Wednesday January 28 2015, @06:58PM
can they put Humpty Dumpty back together again?
(Score: 2) by mendax on Wednesday January 28 2015, @09:17PM
Piss is what the Romans used to clean clothes and wash hair. And *drumroll please* urea is a component of some modern shampoo. Think about that the next time you wash your hair.
It's really quite a simple choice: Life, Death, or Los Angeles.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 28 2015, @09:39PM
I just aim up.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Thursday January 29 2015, @05:19AM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by mhajicek on Wednesday January 28 2015, @11:10PM
but is it frosty?
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek