Category Chemistry/Nanotechnology

Glued to the spot: Max Planck scientists from Stuttgart have used gallium as an adhesive to grip a glass sphere with a movable punch model. The metal is located at the bottom of the punch model. Once it touches the glass sphere, the researchers heat the gallium and then cool it off again, so that it connects to the glass. This way, they can retract the sphere from the surface. Credit: © MPI for Intelligent Systems

Researchers are suggesting gallium as just such a reversible adhesive. By inducing slight changes in temperature, they can control whether a layer of gallium sticks or not. This is based on the fact that gallium transitions from a solid state to a liquid state at ~30C...

The sheet made of cellulose nanofibers in the mille-feuille filter which can remove resistant viruses from water. Research led by Albert Mihranyan, Professor of Nanotechnology at Uppsala University, Image by Simon Gustafsson. Credit: Simon Gustafsson

A simple paper sheet made by scientists at Uppsala University can improve the quality of life for millions of people by removing resistant viruses from water. The sheet, made of cellulose nanofibers, is called the mille-feuille filter as it has a unique layered internal architecture resembling that of the French puff pastry mille-feuille (English translation thousand leaves)...

The research team, left to right: Brookhaven Lab research collaborator David Szalda, Baruch College; David Shaffer, Yan Xie, and Javier Concepcion, Brookhaven Lab. Not pictured: Anna Lewandowska-Andralojc, Adam Mickiewicz University. Credit: Image courtesy of DOE/Brookhaven National Laboratory

For artificial photosynthesis to become a viable alternative to fossil fuels, the efficiency and speed of water oxidation ie into O2, H ions, and electrons–is one of the processes that must be improved. By accelerating formation of O-O bond in water oxidation, newly developed ruthenium catalysts could drive the reaction needed to efficiently store solar energy in the chemical bonds of clean fuels.

The 2 catalysts–complexes of ruthenium surrounded by binding molecules (ligands) containing phosphonate ...

This is a computer graphic of an RNA molecule. Credit: Richard Feldmann/Wikipedia

A team of chemists at Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich has shown how the purines adenine and guanine can be synthesized easily and in reasonable yields, offering more evidence that RNA could have served as the origin of life on Earth. The team describes the process they took in looking for evidence that RNA could have been the first self-replicating molecule that eventually led to all life on our planet and what they found.

Four Nitrogenous Bases in RNA: Adenine, Guanine, Cytosine

For several years many scientists have supported the idea that life got its start on our planet due to a series of events that led to the creation of RNA molecules—it seems like a strong candidate because it is able to both st...