The interplay between solutes and water is central to understand the liquid world around us: water modulates the magnitude and the kinetics of the interactions between solutes, and how solutes respond to mechanical force; solutes affect the structure and dynamics of water. My group has explored this interplay from the perspective of the solute and that of the water in a variety of systems, using simulations. In this talk I will discuss recent results for two distinct systems: the interactions of fluorinated amino acids and water, and the mechanical response of protein helices and coiled coils to applied force.