Chemistry is based on formation and decay of the covalent bond. The bond is one of the most successful concepts in science and it is possible to state that present theoretical and quantum chemistry can fully describe its nature. Biology needs much weaker interactions and covalent bonding clearly does not fulfil this requirement. So, besides strong covalent bonding, nature has been forced to create other, considerably weaker bonds to represent the basic machinery for the very existence of life. These bonds are called non-covalent interactions and their nature is completely different from that of the covalent bond. Non-covalent interactions act between different molecules as well as between parts of a single molecule.
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