Consider a perfectly assembled clathrin cage that is composed of 12 pentagons and 20 hexagons and therefore resembles a soccer ball. How many clathrin heavy chains are there in this cage? Write down the number as your answer, e.g. 24.

Question

Quizplus · Accepted Answer

There is one triskelion at each vertex. The number of vertices is calculated as follows:
Number of vertices = [(12 × 5) + (20 × 6)] / 3 = 60
(There are five vertices around each pentagon and six vertices around each hexagon. Each vertex is counted three times this way, the reason why we divide the sum by 3.)
Since each triskelion contains three heavy chains, the number of heavy chains equals 180.

Consider a Perfectly Assembled Clathrin Cage That Is Composed of 12