2.2 What makes biochemistry and molecular biology so difficult?

Biochemistry and molecular biology have a reputation for being difficult to understand. This is not altogether undeserved! When you begin these disciplines, there is a lot of new information, many new terms to learn and some difficult concepts. One aspect that makes biochemistry and molecular biology difficult is that they draw on knowledge from other disciplines – most heavily from biology, which provides the relevance; but also chemistry, which provides the molecular understanding; and to a certain extent mathematics and physics (see Figure 2.2). As a student you will need to be prepared to integrate knowledge from these other disciplines. If you were to specialise in biochemistry or molecular biology, it is likely you would take classes at some point in all of these disciplines.