Feature Channels: Chemistry

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A chemical hormone released in the body as a reaction to stress could be a key trigger of the mechanism for the late onset of Alzheimer’s disease.

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Memory improved in mice injected with a small, drug-like molecule discovered by UCSF San Francisco researchers studying how cells respond to biological stress.

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In an article published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) a research team from University of North Carolina at Charlotte announced that they had uncovered a previously unknown surveillance mechanism, known as a DNA damage checkpoint, used by cells to monitor oxidatively damaged DNA. The finding, first-authored by UNC Charlotte biology graduate student Jeremy Willis and undergraduate honors student Yogin Patel, was also co-authored by undergraduate honors student Barry L. Lentz and assistant professor of biology Shan Yan.

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Monell researchers identified odorants from human skin cells that can be used to identify melanoma, the deadliest form of skin cancer. In addition a nanotechnology-based sensor could reliably differentiate melanoma cells from normal skin cells. Non-invasive odor analysis may be a valuable technique in the detection and early diagnosis of human melanoma.

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Begun over 20 years ago at The University of Alabama in Huntsville (UAH) to study medicinal properties of Costa Rican plants, the Natural Products Drug Discovery Group has branched out to Africa, Australia, the Bahamas, Yemen and Cuba.

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Scientists at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory have designed and tested an all-solid lithium-sulfur battery with approximately four times the energy density of conventional lithium-ion technologies that power today’s electronics.

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Researchers are targeting a possible new weapon in the fight against malaria, science that could also be applied in the fight against other devastating mosquito-borne illnesses, according to a Vanderbilt study published in PLOS ONE.

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Chemical engineers have discovered a new chemical process to make p-xylene, an important ingredient of plastics for products such as soda bottles and packaging, at 90 percent yield from lignocellulosic biomass, the highest yield achieved to date. Details are in the current issue of Green Chemistry.

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In an age when microbial pathogens are growing increasingly resistant to the conventional antibiotics used to tamp down infection, a team of Wisconsin scientists has synthesized a potent new class of compounds capable of curbing the bacteria that cause staph infections.

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Plastic additives known as phthalates (pronounced THAL-ates) are odorless, colorless and just about everywhere: They turn up in flooring, plastic cups, beach balls, plastic wrap, intravenous tubing and—according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention—the bodies of most Americans. Once perceived as harmless, phthalates have come under increasing scrutiny. A growing collection of evidence suggests dietary exposure to phthalates (which can leech from packaging and mix with food) may cause significant metabolic and hormonal abnormalities, especially during early development.

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A new study shows how complex biochemical transformations may have been possible under conditions that existed when life began on the early Earth. The study shows that RNA is capable of catalyzing electron transfer under conditions similar to those of the early Earth.

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When it comes to cleaning up the next massive crude oil spill, one of the best and most eco-friendly solutions for the job may be low-grade cotton from West Texas.

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Some materials dissolve too quickly, before cardiac arteries can fully heal, and some hang around forever. Zinc, however, may be just right.

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Experiments at Johns Hopkins have unearthed clues about which protein signaling molecules are allowed into hollow, hair-like “antennae,” called cilia, that alert cells to critical changes in their environments.

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Breaking research appearing online today in Clinical Chemistry, the journal of AACC, demonstrates that a recently developed diagnostic test can detect the new strain of influenza (H7N9) currently causing an outbreak in China.

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An international team of researchers, including Scripps Institution of Oceanography, UC San Diego, geochemist James Day, has found new evidence that material contained in oceanic lava flows originated in Earth’s ancient Archean crust.

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An international team of researchers, led by scientists at Boston University’s Department of Earth and Environment, has found evidence that material contained in young oceanic lava flows originated at the Earth’s surface in the Archean (>2.45 billions years ago). The new finding helps constrain the timing of the initiation of plate tectonics, the origin of some of the chemical heterogeneity in the Earth’s mantle, and may shed light on how the chaotically convecting mantle could preserve such material for so long. The study appears in the April 25 issue of the journal Nature

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A team of researchers led by Artem R. Oganov, a professor of theoretical crystallography in the Department of Geosciences, has made a startling prediction that challenges existing chemical models and current understanding of planetary interiors — magnesium oxide, a major material in the formation of planets, can exist in several different compositions. The team’s findings, “Novel stable compounds in the Mg-O system under high pressure,” are published in the online edition of Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics. The existence of these compounds — which are radically different from traditionally known or expected materials — could have important implications.

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A Sandia Labs engineer who trained U.S. soldiers to avoid improvised explosive devices (IEDs) has developed a fertilizer that helps plants grow but can’t detonate a bomb. It’s an alternative to ammonium nitrate, an agricultural staple that is also the raw ingredient in most of the IEDs in Afghanistan.

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When the space shuttle Atlantis touched down in the summer of 2011 at Cape Canaveral, closing the book on the U.S. shuttle program, a team of U.S. Army researchers stood at the ready, eager to get their gloved hands on a small device in the payload that housed a set of biological samples. On Monday at the Experimental Biology 2013 conference in Boston, the team will present the results of nearly two years’ worth of study on those samples, results that shed light on how the human immune system responds to stress and assaults while in space – and maybe here on Earth.

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Fundamental changes are needed in the education of the scientists whose work impacts medicine, drug discovery, development of sustainable new fuels and other global challenges society is facing in the 21st century. Those changes in graduate education in chemistry are the topic of a special symposium here today at the 245th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society, the world’s largest scientific society.

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Peter J. Stang, Ph.D., distinguished professor of chemistry at the University of Utah and editor of the Journal of the American Chemical Society (JACS), has been named winner of the 2013 Priestley Medal by the American Chemical Society (ACS). It is the highest honor bestowed by the world’s largest scientific society.

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Cooking an egg may seem like the simplest of culinary arts, but this process remains the topic of a huge controversy among chefs and experts on the chemistry of cooking. Two such experts today will lead off a special edition of a popular live broadcast series originating here courtesy of the American Chemical Society (ACS), the world’s largest scientific society.

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Renowned for its cuisine and chefs and as a global hub of the energy industry, New Orleans this week hosts what news media have described as the “World Series of Science,” one of the year’s largest and most important scientific conferences. The meeting, which begins today and continues through Thursday, happens to have the theme “CHEF,” which stands for “The Chemistry of Energy and Food.”

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Scientists at The Scripps Research Institute have illuminated the mechanism at the heart of one of the most useful processes in modern chemistry. A reaction that is robust and easy to perform, it is widely employed to synthesize new pharmaceuticals, biological probes, new materials and other products.

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Dark and sleek, it hides beneath the water waiting for prey. A Texas Tech University researcher says the target will never know what hit them because they probably can’t smell the voracious pirate perch.

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Even though the concept is important to plant and human physiology, osmosis is understood in biology and chemistry in simple -- and often incorrect -- way.

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Tiny versions of the reflectors on sneakers and bicycle fenders that help ensure the safety of runners and bikers at night are moving toward another role in detecting bioterrorism threats and diagnosing everyday infectious diseases, scientists said today.

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The most serious ongoing water pollution problem in the Gulf of Mexico originates not from oil rigs, as many people believe, but rainstorms and fields of corn and soybeans a thousand miles away in the Midwest. An expert on that problem — the infamous Gulf of Mexico “Dead Zone” — today called for greater awareness of the connections between rainfall and agriculture in the Midwest and the increasingly severe water quality problems in the gulf.

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Already renowned as a healthy treat when enjoyed in moderation, chocolate could become even more salubrious if manufacturers embraced new technology for making “fruit-juice-infused chocolate,” a scientist said here today. The presentation was part of the 245th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society, the world’s largest scientific society, which continues through Thursday.

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After virtually eliminating arsenic as a useful tool for homicide, science now faces challenges in doing the same for natural sources of this fabled old “inheritance powder” that contaminates water supplies and food, threatening more than 35 million people worldwide.

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At least nine Nobel laureates have research that will be presented here this week during the 245th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society, the world’s largest scientific society. Research from the laureates’ teams will be among almost 12,000 presentations during the event, expected to attract more than 14,000 scientists and others.

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The Gulf of Mexico may have a much greater natural ability to self-clean oil spills than previously believed, an expert in bioremediation said here today at the 245th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society (ACS), the world’s largest scientific society.

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With global climate change and the prospect of another record-hot summer on the minds of millions of people, experts have gathered here today to encourage scientists to take a more active role in communicating the topic to the public, policy makers and others. The symposium, “Understanding Climate Science: A Scientist's Responsibility,” is part of the 245th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society (ACS), the world’s largest scientific society.

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Mention a breakthrough involving “gumbo” technology in this city, and people think of a new twist on The Local Dish, the stew that’s the quintessence of southern Louisiana cooking. But scientific presentations at a meeting of the world’s largest scientific society this week are focusing on what may be an advance in developing GUMBOS-based materials with far-reaching medical, electronic and other uses.

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The search for ways to use megatons of carbon dioxide that may be removed from industrial smokestacks during efforts to curb global warming has led to a process for converting that major greenhouse gas back into the fuel that released it in the first place. Research on the project was a topic here today at the 245th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society, the world’s largest scientific society.

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Scientists today reported a discovery that could speed an emerging effort to replace ethanol in gasoline with a substantially better fuel additive called butanol, which some experts regard as “the gasoline of the future.” Their report on this discovery, which holds potential to reduce the costs of converting ethanol factories to production of butanol, came at the 245th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society, the world’s largest scientific society.

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In a discovery suggesting that odors may have a far more important role in life than previously believed, scientists have found that heart, blood, lung and other cells in the body have the same receptors for sensing odors that exist in the nose. It opens the door to questions about whether the heart, for instance, “smells” that fresh-brewed cup of coffee or cinnamon bun, according to the research leader, who spoke here today at the 245th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society, the world’s largest scientific society.

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Technology that enlists natural soil bacteria as 21st century roughnecks now is commercially available and poised to recover precious oil remaining in thousands of exhausted oil wells, according to a scientist who spoke here today. His report on a process termed microbially enhanced oil recovery (MEOR) was part of the 245th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society, the world’s largest scientific society.

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Top leaders in chemistry — a $760 billion annual enterprise in the United States and $3.5 trillion worldwide — are gathering here today to consider a formula for ensuring the future success of the scientists whose work touches 96 percent of all the world’s manufactured goods.

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Scientists today answered a question that worries millions of owners and potential owners of electric and hybrid vehicles using lithium-ion batteries: How long before the battery pack dies, leaving a sticker-shock bill for a fresh pack or a car ready for the junk heap? Their answer, presented here at the 245th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society (ACS), being held here this week, may surprise skeptics.

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What was in Dr. F. G. Johnson’s French Female Pills and other scientifically untested elixirs, nostrums and other quack cures that were the only medicines available to sick people during the 18th, 19th and early 20th centuries?

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The eyes sometimes have it, beating out the tongue, nose and brain in the emotional and biochemical balloting that determines the taste and allure of food, a scientist said here today. Speaking at the 245th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society (ACS), the world’s largest scientific society, he described how people sometimes “see” flavors in foods and beverages before actually tasting them.

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Scientists today described evidence that natural substances extracted from unroasted coffee beans can help control the elevated blood sugar levels and body weight that underpin type 2 diabetes. Their presentation on chlorogenic acids ― widely available as a dietary supplement ― was part of the 245th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society (ACS), the world’s largest scientific society, being held here this week.

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An advance in micromotor technology akin to the invention of cars that fuel themselves from the pavement or air, rather than gasoline or batteries, is opening the door to broad new medical and industrial uses for these tiny devices, scientists said here today. Their update on development of the motors — so small that thousands would fit inside this “o” — was part of the 245th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society, the world’s largest scientific society, being held here this week.

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The mystery of how arsenic levels in beer sold in Germany could be higher than in the water or other ingredients used to brew the beer has been solved, scientists announced here today at the 245th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society, the world’s largest scientific society. The meeting, which features almost 12,000 reports and other presentations, continues through Thursday.

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Another innovative feature has been added to the world’s first practical “artificial leaf,” making the device even more suitable for providing people in developing countries and remote areas with electricity, scientists reported here today. It gives the leaf the ability to self-heal damage that occurs during production of energy.

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With lithium-ion batteries in the news for grounding the Boeing 787 Dreamliner fleet — and as a fixture in many consumer electronics products — li-ion technology is the topic of dozens of potentially newsworthy scientific reports that begin here today. The presentations are part of the 245th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society, the world’s largest scientific society.

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Call their taste and effects appealing or appalling, no matter. In a city that claims credit for invention of the cocktail, the Hurricane, Sazerac, Pimm’s Cup, Bayou Bash, Hand Grenade, Ramos Gin Fizz and other concoctions are the spirits of the French Quarter and its most famous thoroughfare, which happens to be named Bourbon Street.