chemistry

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Essential Compound to Life Birthed in a Lab
Essential Compound
to Life Birthed in a Lab
NEW STUDY
Mar 1, 2024 12:26 PM CST

Essential Compound to Life Birthed in a Lab

No extreme heat or complex molecules required, meaning life may be more common than thought

(Newser) - "Why do we have life?" It's a massive question scientists have inched closer to answering in creating an essential compound for life in a lab, using simple molecules likely around during Earth's early days. All organisms are made from primary metabolites, directly involved in cell growth and...

For the Perfect Cup of Tea, Add Salt, Says Chemist

Chemistry professor Michelle Francl shares tips for reducing bitterness and 'scum'

(Newser) - Ask tea drinkers how to make the perfect cup and you're sure to get all kinds of responses. Use loose leaf. Steep extra long. Add milk last. Don't add milk at all. The best tea, after all, is subjective. Or is it? Michelle Francl, a professor of chemistry...

Accused of Poisoning Neighbors With Opioids, PhD Student Deported

Xuming Li of China lost student visa following charges, expulsion

(Newser) - A chemistry PhD student who was allegedly caught injecting opioids through the door of an upstairs neighbor with whom he quarreled over noise will escape charges in the US, as he's been deported to his native China. Xuming Li, 36, faced felony charges of battery and possession of a...

Nobel Prize in Chemistry Winners Revealed in Rare Leak

Moungi Bawendi, Louis Brus, Alexei Ekimov honored for their work on quantum dots

(Newser) - Two American and one Russian scientist have won the Nobel Prize in chemistry for their work on tiny quantum dots—after receiving an accidental early heads-up. Moungi Bawendi of MIT, Louis Brus of Columbia University, and Alexei Ekimov of Nanocrystals Technology Inc., were honored for their work with the tiny...

Firing of an NYU Chemistry Professor Is a Contentious One

Students had issues with Dr. Maitland Jones Jr.'s organic chemistry course

(Newser) - When it comes to organic chemistry, Dr. Maitland Jones Jr. wrote the book. Literally. The author of the 1,300-page textbook Organic Chemistry, which is now in its fifth edition, spent his career at Princeton before retiring and teaching the subject at New York University under a series of yearly...

Trio of Nobel Winners Have Helped Make Chemistry 'Click'

K. Barry Sharpless wins 2022 honor with Carolyn Bertozzi, Morten Meldal; Sharpless has won before

(Newser) - This year's Nobel Prize in chemistry has been awarded in equal parts to Carolyn R. Bertozzi, Morten Meldal, and K. Barry Sharpless for developing ways of "snapping molecules together" that can be used to design medicines. Their work, known as click chemistry and bioorthogonal reactions, is used to...

Discovery Means 'Forever Chemicals' May Get a Death Date
Simple Remedy
Provides Hope on
'Forever Chemicals'
NEW STUDY
Aug 19, 2022 11:29 AM CDT

Simple Remedy Provides Hope on 'Forever Chemicals'

Researchers describe novel method of breaking down PFAS safely and cheaply

(Newser) - Scientists know them as poly- and perfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS. Everyday folk know them as "forever chemicals." However you refer to them, these chemicals, resistant to liquid and heat and used in everyday products from cosmetics to paint to paper to food packaging , are toxic at certain levels...

Chemistry Nobel Awarded for Work in a 'Difficult Art'

Benjamin List of Germany and Princeton's David MacMillan win for new way of building molecules

(Newser) - The Nobel Prize for chemistry has been awarded to German scientist Benjamin List of the Max Planck Institute and Scotland-born scientist David WC MacMillan of Princeton University. They were cited for their work in developing a new way for building molecules known as "asymmetric organocatalysis." The winners were...

2 Women Win Chemistry Nobel for Tool With 'Enormous Power'

Emmanuelle Charpentier, Jennifer A. Doudna claim prize for their genome editing method

(Newser) - French scientist Emmanuelle Charpentier and American Jennifer A. Doudna have won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for developing a method of genome editing likened to "molecular scissors" that offer the promise of one day curing genetic diseases. The recipients were announced Wednesday in Stockholm by the Royal Swedish Academy...

Harvard's Chemistry Chair Accused of Lying About China

Charles Lieber was arrested on Tuesday

(Newser) - There's another big story out that mentions Wuhan—just one not related to the coronavirus. The chair of Harvard's chemistry department was on Tuesday charged with making false statements to the Department of Defense regarding his role in China's Thousand Talents Plan. Bloomberg explains that it and...

Chemistry Professors Arrested in Meth Probe

One had said 'Breaking Bad' was a boon to recruiting

(Newser) - Two chemistry professors in Arkansas have been accused of breaking bad, and have been arrested on suspicion of making methamphetamine. Terry David Bateman, 45, and Bradley Allen Rowland, 40, have been on administrative leave since Oct. 11, the Democrat-Gazette reports, days after a chemical odor was reported in the science...

From Nobel's Chem Prize Winners: Batteries

John B. Goodenough, M. Stanley Whittingham, and Akira Yoshino brought us lithium-ion batteries

(Newser) - The 2019 Nobel Prize in Chemistry has been awarded to the US' John B. Goodenough and M. Stanley Whittingham, and Japan's Akira Yoshino for the development of lithium-ion batteries, per the AP . "Lithium-ion batteries have revolutionized our lives and are used in everything from mobile phones to laptops...

The 'Rainbow Experiment' Went Wrong. Now, a $60M Payout

Ex-high school student Alonzo Yanes suffered 3rd-degree burns over 30% of his body

(Newser) - Anna Poole was simply trying to show her high school chemistry class the "Rainbow Experiment," which illustrates how mineral salts change color when an accelerant, usually methanol, is poured on. But the 2014 experiment went wrong, one of her students was severely burned by the resulting fireball, and...

Nobel Laureates 'Harnessed the Power of Evolution'

2 Americans and a Brit take home the Nobel in chemistry

(Newser) - Three researchers who "harnessed the power of evolution" to produce enzymes and antibodies that have led to new drugs and biofuels have been named winners of the Nobel Prize in chemistry, reports the AP . Half of the $1.01 million prize goes to Frances Arnold of the California Institute...

Chemists' Ability to 'Freeze Biomolecules' Wins Nobel

3 scientists from the US, Britain, and Switzerland will share it

(Newser) - Three researchers based in the US, UK, and Switzerland have won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for developments in electron microscopy. The $1.1 million prize is shared by Jacques Dubochet of the University of Lausanne, Joachim Frank at New York's Columbia University, and Richard Henderson of MRC Laboratory...

Chemists Discover Why Water Improves Whisky

How much is largely a matter of personal taste

(Newser) - Whisky connoisseurs have long claimed that whisky tastes better with a splash of water, or on the rocks with ice cubes. And while that will always, ultimately, be a matter of taste, scientists in Sweden have decided to study how the addition of water chemically alters the drink. They report...

Simple Trick May Help Plants Survive Drought
Simple Trick May Help
Plants Survive Drought
NEW STUDY
Jul 10, 2017 9:37 AM CDT

Simple Trick May Help Plants Survive Drought

The effect was seen in rice, wheat, corn, and more

(Newser) - As the climate warms, scientists are conducting experiments around the world to try to boost drought resistance in a wide range of crops. But a study out of the RIKEN Center for Sustainable Resource Science in Japan is especially promising because the key ingredient helping a wide range of crops...

Martin Shkreli Now Praising Kids Who Made Cheap Drug

He makes congratulatory video after belittling their work on Twitter

(Newser) - A bunch of Aussie schoolkids produced a $2-a-pill version of a super-expensive anti-parasitic drug ($750 per dose), and the man behind the latter drug's huge price hike is now praising their efforts, Reuters reports. In a YouTube video directed toward students at Sydney Grammar School, ex-Turing Pharmaceuticals CEO Martin...

Take That, Martin Shkreli: Schoolkids Cook Up $2 Dose

High school students show cheap version of pricey drug is easy to make

(Newser) - Remember Martin Shkreli, the hedge fund manager who last year founded Turing Pharmaceuticals, acquired an essential anti-parasitic drug, and quickly jacked up its price 55-fold, from $13.50 to $750 a pill? Well, he's just been shown up by a group of high school chemistry students in Australia who'...

Chemists Stumble on First New Blue in 200 Years

Pigment also makes possible a new spectrum of colors that could be mixed using it

(Newser) - Back in 2009, a materials science professor and his students were, in a sense, playing with fire in a lab at Oregon State University—well, mixing chemicals and heating them to temperatures above 2,000 degrees anyway—when they accidentally created a new blue. The happy accident occurred during an...

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