A Biologist’s St. Patrick’s Day Song

Lyrics taken from the video’s YouTube page.

In the year of our lord eighteen hundred and eleven On March the seventeenth day I will raise up a beer and I'll raise up a cheer For Saccharomyces cerevisiae Here's to brewers yeast, that humblest of all beasts Producing carbon gas reducing acetaldehyde But my friends that isn't all -- it makes ethyl alcohol That is what the yeast excretes and that's what we imbibe

Anaerobic isolation Alcoholic fermentation NADH oxidation Give me a beer

[CHORUS]

My intestinal wall absorbs that ethanol And soon it passes through my blood-brain barrier There's a girl in the next seat who I didn't think that sweet But after a few drinks I want to marry her I guess it's not surprising, my dopamine is rising And my glutamate receptors are all shot I'd surely be bemoaning all the extra serotonin But my judgment is impaired and my confidence is not

Allosteric modulation No Long Term Potentiation Hastens my inebriation Give me a beer

[CHORUS]

When ethanol is in me, some shows up in my kidneys And inhibits vasopressin by degrees  A decrease in aquaporins hinders water re-absorption And pretty soon I really have to pee Well my liver breaks it down so my body can rebound By my store of glycogen is soon depleted And tomorrow when I'm sober I will also be hungover Cause I flushed electrolytes that my nerves and muscles needed

Diuretic activation Urination urination  Urination dehydration Give me a beer

[CHORUS]

CHORDS

Intro:  D DAG / bm A D D A G / bm A G D G D A G / G D G A G D A bm / G D A D

Pre - chorus: G D A bm / G D A

Chorus (Li-Diddly-I): G D A bm A G D A D

Verse: D DAG / Bm A D D A G / Bm A G D G D A G / bm A G D A bm / G D A D