# een zuil van meccano



## Chiapas

In een Genetica Museum onze held staat voor een 3D schaalmodel van een DNA molecuul en hij zegt:
"Ik liep nog een extra rondje om het als een zuil van meccano oprijzende molecuul."

Ik moet het inaar het Italiaans vertalen, maar alle suggesties ook naar het Engels/Frans/Spaans zijn zeer welcome!

Alvast Bedankt!


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## Suehil

'A molecule that rose like a column made of Meccano.'  Does that help?


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## Peterdg

Just in case: Meccano was the brand name of toys when I was young: it consisted of metal plates with holes, together with screws and bolds and you couild build stuff with it; somewhat like lego now.


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## Chiapas

You think so? In that case should'n Meccano be written with an hooftletter? I see that in internet there is something called "moleculaire meccano" http://vorige.nrc.nl/wetenschap/article1728458.ece
but I don't understand very good what it is and how it can be related with my text.


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## HKK

Peterdg is right. The author compares molecular structures to meccano structures: they both have "nodes" where "branches" come together. Look at this quote from the article:



> Andere impressies doen denken aan wijd vertakte boomwortels, uit de hand gelopen bouwsels uit de meccanodoos of buitenissige sneeuwvlokken.


Other impressions remind one of widely branched tree roots, escalated structures from a box of meccano or extravagant snowflakes.

Whether it needs a hoof_d_letter depends. If you consider meccano a very well known brand, it is possible to write it without a capital letter. The usual example for this is the word _jeep_, which is often used to mean any 4x4 terrain car and written without a cap. By the way, the first paragraphs of this article are written in a surprisingly lyrical style, because the author is expressing his wonder at the structure of the world.


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## NewtonCircus

Chiapas said:


> In that case should'n Meccano be written with an hooftletter?



Yes,in school we would have been penalised for this . 

The authors of the sentence you have in your post and the article in the link both want to describe that the molecules resemble a column-like structure made of Meccano parts. When you read through the document this becomes obvious even as a layman in this field.

The title in the article does therefore not really reflect a field-of-study but is only metaphorical. Unfortunately only a biologist can tell you why.

Groetjes Herman


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## NewtonCircus

HKK beats me. It seems that the bits and bytes from Singapore are slower


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## Chiapas

HOOF*D*LETTER of course!!!!!
Ash on my head and beans onder my knees for it


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