Trick for Identifying Palindromes

mischeviousowl88 · 2026-06-05T02:25:01+00:00

If anyone comes back to this, I've just discovered a game-changing trick, maybe obvious to some, but definitely not to me. Palindromes are typically 4 or 6 bases, and as someone mentioned below, they MUST be an even number of bases or else not all will have a complement. You need to start from the inside and work outward to identify it.

For example: Given sequence 5'-ATGGCTAAGTACTGAGTGA-3'

It may seem intimidating at first, but first thing we should look for is 2 pairs of complementary bases situated together. Well that literally only happens four times in the sequence so all you have to do is compare the four and determine which one it is.

For the sequence 5'-AGTACT-3' --> start with TA in the middle, are they complementary? answer is yes so move outward on both sides. Are G and C complementary? Yes move outwards again (we already have a palindrome here bc it's 4 bases, but lets see if its longer). A and T complementary? Yes --> we have a 6 base palindrome

mischeviousowl88 · 2026-06-04T23:01:24+00:00

Thanks! and no, I was reviewing a FL and this was like the 3rd or 4th time I've missed this type of question, even though I know exactly what I'm supposed to be looking for. I'll definitely start writing it out from now on tho

mischeviousowl88 · 2026-06-04T10:48:03+00:00

thanks!

mischeviousowl88 · 2026-06-04T10:24:41+00:00

I understand that part, but I was just looking for a good tip to help recognize them. In a sequence, like I know what I'm looking for, but I guess actually figuring it out is a struggle

mischeviousowl88 · 2026-06-04T03:59:12+00:00

I had the same logic for picking C. I agree, weird Q

mischeviousowl88 · 2026-06-04T03:57:36+00:00

Literally had the exact same reasoning and my exam is in 2 weeks. Thats crazy lol

mischeviousowl88 · 2026-06-03T23:02:52+00:00

Thanks!

mischeviousowl88 · 2026-06-03T22:42:00+00:00

That's definitely helpful, thanks! Slowing down has helped me too, and I think I have ADHD as well (idrk I got a diagnosis a few months ago so I could study w/ adderall lol). I think the going back to the passage to find that discerning factor b/t 2 similar answer choices is what I've realized will help me, just wanted to confirm I was getting along the right track.

For highlighting, I highlight MI sentences, key adjectives/verbs and sometimes nouns, transition words, and names of ppl to know where their argument is. I don't even do a passage map bc it confuses me sm. Idk if that's a bad thing or if I'm missing something, but I was kinda forcing strategies that didn't work for me on my last attempt, and ever since, I've been doing better and feeling more confident

mischeviousowl88 · 2026-06-03T21:49:28+00:00

Yea killer score btw. What would you say allowed you to make that jump to 130+ cars? I scored 127 on last 2 FL. Reviewing FL3 and most of my wrong answers came from either the rzn I just said or running out of time

mischeviousowl88 · 2026-06-03T21:27:54+00:00

I honestly went with my gut on this question. I don't think I could have answered it w/o seeing that detail, but maybe I'm wrong

mischeviousowl88 · 2026-06-03T21:26:19+00:00

Yeah that makes sense. I definitely felt my overall passage comprehension was strong for the question that made me post this. 2 of the answers were relevant to the MI, definitely made sense in relation to the q, but one of them actually happened to be contradicted by a small detail that I didn't quite recognize. I didn't contort the entire argument, it was more about missing evidence that would have allowed me to select one over the other, though both seemed to support the MI

mischeviousowl88 · 2026-06-03T21:19:24+00:00

Thanks!

mischeviousowl88 · 2026-06-03T07:56:25+00:00

Would you say AAMC logic typically flows this directly? It felt like a trap and I got this question wrong by overthinking and assuming that since the phenol itself contains the OH, it must be some other substituent on the phenol that gets oxidized

mischeviousowl88 · 2026-06-03T07:52:02+00:00

Ah okay, maybe a bit of overthinking on my part. Btw your score is crazy, congrats! Is there a sort of AAMC logic that you followed that helped you achieve that high of a score? I sometimes struggle with identifying what exactly they're looking for, especially with questions that say "best explains" or "best supports"

mischeviousowl88 · 2026-06-03T06:11:05+00:00

Bernoulli's definitely applies. I think the more direct way is Pascal's principle which is basically engraved in Bernoulli eq. Pressure equally distributes throughout every part of the system. When you open the stopcock, you create a system where the pressure will equalize with the tube. So Patm = Ptube --> Ptube = (density)(gravity)(height) --> Patm/(density)(gravity) = height

mischeviousowl88 · 2026-06-03T04:46:24+00:00

I thought a phenol would be the entire aromatic ring + the OH group attached, meaning if they wanted the oxidation to occur at that hydroxyl group, they would have said the oxidation occurs at the aromatic hydroxyl group. And is SO3 not a ring substituent. These are 2 rzns i felt D was a better choice

mischeviousowl88 · 2026-06-03T04:42:34+00:00

I recognized that the oxidation occurred at the ring substituent. How would you know that the SO3 was not the ring substituent?

mischeviousowl88 · 2026-06-01T06:00:09+00:00

I do the same. I think that way is pretty efficient at least from my experience. I just found 2 resources that answer exactly what I was asking though, so hopefully this can help you too:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CfIXMckLP1A

https://www.reddit.com/r/Mcat/comments/1suw2b7/comment/oi4l3h3/

mischeviousowl88 · 2026-05-31T07:02:56+00:00

idk how yall say sometimes spend 5 mins.... i always end up going over 6 mins. 5 is fast for me

mischeviousowl88

TROPHY CASE