code: def encode_chain_list(in_strings):
      
      out_bytes = b""
      for in_s in in_strings:
          out_bytes+=in_s.encode('ascii')
          for i in range(mmtf.utils.constants.CHAIN_LEN -len(in_s)):
              out_bytes+= mmtf.utils.constants.NULL_BYTE.encode('ascii')
      return out_bytes
docs: Convert a list of strings to a list of byte arrays.
  
      :param in_strings: the input strings
      :return the encoded list of byte arrays