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The Best of Both Catalytic Worlds

By Guest PostOctober 13, 2012ScienceBerkeley, berkeley lab, biochemistry, biomolecule, california, cancer, catalysis program, catalyst, catalytic reactivity, chemical reaction, cholesterol medicine, complex reaction, cyclopropanation reaction, cyclopropane, dean toste, dendrimers, elad gross, enzyme, gabor somorjai, gold nanocluster, heterogeneous, homogeneous, industrial catalyst, metal catalysts, metal nanocluster, molecule, palladium, pamam, platinum, product selectivity, property, protein, recyclability, rhodium, substance, university

Berkeley Lab Researchers Develop New Technique for Heterogenizing Homogenous Nano Catalysts

Catalysts are substances that speed up the rates of chemical reactions without themselves being chemically changed. Industrial catalysts come in two main types – heterogeneous, in which the catalyst is in a different phase from the reactants; and homogeneous, in which catalyst and the reactants are in the same phase. Heterogeneous catalysts are valued for their sustainability because they can be recycled. Homogeneous catalysts are valued for their product selectivity as their properties can be easily tuned through relatively simple chemistry.

Researchers with the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) have combined the best properties of both types of industrial catalysts by encapsulating nanoclusters of a metallic heterogeneous catalyst within the branched arms of the molecules known as dendrimers. (more…)

Energy in Action

By Guest PostMay 16, 2012Scienceaction, ambre alexander, attraction, biomolecule, blind date, bulletproof body armor, crystallographic structure, dispersion method, dispersionless density functional, dldf, dutch physicist, energy, Europe, force, krzysztof szalewicz, molecule, motions of electrons, new method, nobel prize, physics, poland, polymorphs, rafal podeszwa, repulsion, thomson reuters, tracey bryant, tylenol, university of delaware, university of silesia, van der waals

For two molecules on blind date, new method predicts potential for attraction or repulsion

Krzysztof Szalewicz, professor of physics and astronomy at the University of Delaware, and Rafal Podeszwa of the University of Silesia Institute of Chemistry in Poland have developed and validated a more accurate method for predicting the interaction energy of large molecules, such as biomolecules used to develop new drugs.

The research is reported as a communication in the April 27 issue of the Journal of Chemical Physics, which is the most highly cited journal in atomic, molecular and chemical physics according to Thomson Reuters. The journal is published by the American Institute of Physics. Despite appearing at the end of April, the paper was on the list of the 20 most-read articles in JCP for that month. (more…)

Exciting New Field of Bioorthogonal Chemistry Owes a Debt to Curiosity-Driven Research from Previous Eras

By Guest PostApril 11, 2012Scienceacs, aza ylide, azide, berkeley lab, biomolecule, bioorthogonal chemistry, carolyn bertozzi, cell, difluorinated cyclotoctyne, difo, dipolar cycloaddition, fluorophore, german chemist, glycans, glycoproteins, hhmi, immune system, irmgard chu, kavli foundation, organism, san diego, toxic

*Carolyn Bertozzi’s Kavli Lecture Highlights Promise of Biorothogonal Chemistry and Its Links to Basic Research From the Past*

“Bioorthogonal chemistry is literally chemistry for life,” said Carolyn Bertozzi, an internationally acclaimed leader and founder of this emerging and highly promising field of science that could fundamentally change drug development and disease diagnostics. In delivering the Kavli Foundation Innovations in Chemistry Lecture at this year’s Spring Meeting of the American Chemical Society (ACS) in San Diego, Bertozzi described how her own ground-breaking research made use of experiments nearly a century ago by two German chemists whose work was driven primarily by scientific curiosity as opposed to the more problem-driven research of today.

Bertozzi is a senior faculty scientist with the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) and the T.Z. and Irmgard Chu Distinguished Professor of Chemistry and Professor of Molecular and Cell Biology at the University of California (UC) Berkeley. She is also an investigator with the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI). The Kavli Foundation is a philanthropic organization that supports basic scientific research. Its ACS lectures are designed to address “the urgent need for vigorous, outside the box thinking by scientists.” (more…)

A Shiny New Tool for Imaging Biomolecules

By Guest PostApril 1, 2012Sciencearrays, berkeley lab, biomolecule, cell, cell membrane, cellular signaling network, chemical signal, christopher rhodes, disease, fluorescent, foreign invader, gold bowtie nanoantennas, gold nanoantenna, gold nanoparticle, hot-spot, hsiung lin tu, immune system, intensity, jay groves, lars iversen, lynn yarris, mark schmidt, optical imaging technique, optical nanoantenna, plasmonics, protein, raman optical signal, theo lohmuller, uc, wan chen lin

*Berkeley Lab Researchers Embed Artificial Membranes with Billions of Nanoantennas for Enhanced Optical Studies*

At the heart of the immune system that protects our bodies from disease and foreign invaders is a vast and complex communications network involving millions of cells, sending and receiving chemical signals that can mean life or death. At the heart of this vast cellular signaling network are interactions between billions of proteins and other biomolecules. These interactions, in turn, are greatly influenced by the spatial patterning of signaling and receptor molecules. The ability to observe signaling spatial patterns in the immune and other cellular systems as they evolve, and to study the impact on molecular interactions and, ultimately, cellular communication, would be a critical tool in the fight against immunological and other disorders that lead to a broad range of health problems including cancer. Such a tool is now at hand. (more…)

Tag Archives: biomolecule

The Best of Both Catalytic Worlds

Energy in Action

Exciting New Field of Bioorthogonal Chemistry Owes a Debt to Curiosity-Driven Research from Previous Eras

A Shiny New Tool for Imaging Biomolecules