Fast, cheap, and easy medical testing devices can help diagnose diseases across the world. Let’s learn about one recently developed to detect HIV!
Category: Biological
Say No to Drugs: Fast and Efficient Drug Detection in Biofluids
How are Olympic doping agents similar to environmental water contaminants? It all relates back to chemical detection methods!
A pass to the cell: designing peptides for drug delivery.
Antibodies can be used as medicines, but they need some help to enter the cell.
In this paper, the help that they need arrives from another molecule that works as a ticket for the cell taxi.
Smart Bandages for Wound Monitoring
“Smart” bandages – or bandages that provide real-time monitoring of the health and progress of wound healing are here!
Nanoreactors for Enzyme Cascades
What are nanoreactors and how can they enhance multi-enzyme reactions? Let’s find out!
Nature Does It Best! – Engineering New Catalysts Using Evolution
As versatile as enzymes already are, it’s actually possible to engineer enzymes to catalyze reactions that are entirely new to nature!
Duality of Iron Oxide Nanoparticles in Cancer Therapy
Title: Duality of Iron Oxide Nanoparticles in Cancer Therapy: Amplification of Heating Efficiency by Magnetic Hyperthermia and Photothermal Bimodal Treatment Authors: Ana Espinosa, Riccardo Di Corato, Jelena Kolosnjaj-Tabi, Patrice Flaud, Teresa Pellegrino, and Claire Wilhelm DOI 10.1021/acsnano.5b07249 By: Ehsan Moaseri – Behzad Changalvaie In our previous…
Plasmonic photothermal therapy (PPTT) using gold nanoparticles
Title: Plasmonic photothermal therapy (PPTT) using gold nanoparticles Authors: Xiaohua Huang, Prashant K. Jain, Ivan H. El-Sayed, Mostafa A. El-Sayed By: Ehsan Moaseri – Behzad Changalvaie Cancer therapeutics have been a principal part of biomedical research in the past two decades. A significant portion of this…
Health Assessment in Your Home via Disposable Breath Analysis Sensors
Title: Diagnosis and Classification of 17 Diseases from 1404 Subjects via Pattern Analysis of Exhaled Molecules Authors: Hossam Haick et al. Publication Info: ACS Nano, 2017, 11 (1), pp 112–125 DOI: 10.1021/acsnano.6b04930 This work reports on the development of a portable, inexpensive, and non-invasive breath analyzer that couples the use…
Future of Cancer Therapy: Advanced Functional Nanomaterials to Image and Deliver Drugs into Tumors
Title: Controlled Assembly of Biodegradable Plasmonic Nanoclusters for Near-Infrared Imaging and Therapeutic Applications Authors: Jasmine M. Tam, Justina O. Tam, Avinash Murthy, Davis R. Ingram, Li Leo Ma, Kort Travis, Keith P. Johnston, and Konstantin V. Sokolov Journal: ACS Nano Gold has been historically a great…
Using Biology to Harness the Power of Fluorine Chemistry
What comes to mind when you think of fluorine? The sodium fluoride in toothpaste and mouthwash is the typical, everyday example that most people think of, but fluorine plays a large role in many other compounds. Pure fluorine is a highly reactive and poisonous gas, while fluorinated compounds are incredibly stable, fairly nontoxic, and used in many real-life applications.
Can adding calcium help forests?
This study further supports a connection between acid deposition and forest decline. The authors state, “Continued vigilance in the control of acid rain precursors will be needed to correct these problems, and aggressive options to reduce pollution in rapidly industrializing regions of Latin America, Asia, and Africa are warranted.”
Harry: Do you know my blood type?……………….. Riddle’s Diary: Yes
Paper-Based Blood Typing Device That Reports Patient’s Blood Type “in Writing” Li, M.; Tian, J.; Al-Tamimi, M.; Shen, W. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2012 …
Prettier than dyed eggs?
The cocoons, the silkworm itself, and the produced silk become colored when dye is incorporated into the silkworm feed. The concentration of dye in the produced silk changes based on how hydrophobic the dye is (increasing partition coefficient).
Shifting with Selenium
I hope most of us have experienced the wonder of watching fireflies lighting up on a warm summer evening.
Metabolic Labeling of Bacterial Membranes
This article demonstrates the metabolic labeling of bacteria without genetic engineering.
Using photochemistry to attach and release biomolecules in hydrogels
Title: Photoreversible Patterning of Biomolecules within Click-Based Hydrogels Authors: Cole A. DeForest and Kristi S. Anseth Journal: Angewandte Chemie International Edition Affiliation: Chemical & Biological Engineering, University of Colorado and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute Hydrogels have become an important category of materials for studying…
Thanksgiving chemistry- cranberries and your blood
To do the biological study of how particular (good) chemicals like antioxidants affect people, there needs to be a quick, reliable, and consistent way to measure those chemicals in humans. Furthermore, a good method would test for multiple chemicals, because the health benefits from some chemicals only exist in the presence of others (phenolic acids and flavonoids in this case). The authors of this paper demonstrate a gas-chromatography mass-spectrometry (GC-MS) method to investigate how some of the chemicals present in cranberries (from cranberry juice) go into your bloodstream after you ingest them.
Sensing Potassium
Title of Post: Sensing Potassium Title: A New Highly Selective Fluorescent K+ Sensor Authors: Xianfeng Zhou, Fengyu Su, Yanqing Tian, Cody Youngbull, Roger H. Johnson, and Deirdre R. Meldrum Journal: Journal of the American Chemical Society Affiliation: Center for Biosignatures Discovery Automation, Biodesign Institute, Arizona State…
Hybrid Photocatalyst for Hydrogen Production
Title: Nature-Driven Photochemistry for Catalytic Solar Hydrogen Production: A Photosystem I–Transition Metal Catalyst Hybrid Authors: Lisa M. Utschig, Sunshine C. Silver, Karen L. Mulfort, and David M. Tiede Journal: Journal of the American Chemical Society Affiliation: * Chemical Sciences and Engineering Division, Argonne National Laboratory, Argonne, Illinois…
Toward Functional Ni-SOD Biomimetics: Achieving a Structural/Electronic Correlation with Redox Dynamics
Title: Toward Functional Ni-SOD Biomimetics: Achieving a Structural/Electronic Correlation with Redox Dynamics Authors: Eric M. Gale†, Andrew C. Simmonett†, Joshua Telser‡, Henry F. Schaefer, III†, and Todd C. Harrop*† Journal: Inorganic Chemistry Affiliation: Department of Chemistry and Center for Computational Chemistry, The University of Georgia Department of Biological, Chemical and…
A Protein-Based Approach for DNA Damage Sensing
Title: Turn-On DNA Damage Sensors for the Direct Detection of 8-Oxoguanine and Photoproducts in Native DNA Authors: Jennifer L. Furman, Pui-Wing Mok, Ahmed H. Badran, and Indraneel Ghosh* Journal: Journal of the American Chemical Society Affiliation: Department of Chemistry and…
What chirality can do for your hydrogel
Title: Enhanced Mechanical Rigidity of Hydrogels Formed from Enantiomeric Peptide Assemblies Authors: Katelyn J. Nagy†‡, Michael C. Giano†‡, Albert Jin§, Darrin J. Pochanǁ, and Joel P. Schneider† Journal: Journal of the American Chemical Society Affiliation: †National Cancer Institute, Center for Cancer Research; ‡University of Delaware, Department…
New Hydrogels from Peptide Sequences Found in Nature
Title: Supramolecular hydrogels based on the epitope of potassium ion channels Authors: Yi Kuang, Yuan Gao, Junfeng Shi, Hsin-Chieh Lin and Bing Xu Journal: Chemical Communications Affiliation: Department of Chemistry, Brandeis University Supramolecular hydrogels are a growing field of research due to their biocompatibility and the…
Intrinsic Proton-Donating Power of Zinc-Bound Water in a Carbonic Anhydrase Active Site Model Estimated by NMR
Title: Intrinsic Proton-Donating Power of Zinc-Bound Water in a Carbonic Anhydrase Active Site Model Estimated by NMR Authors: Stepan B. Lesnichin†‡, Ilya G. Shenderovich*†‡, Titin Muljati†, David Silverman, and Hans-Heinrich Limbach*† Journal: Journal of the American Chemical Society Affiliation: †Institut für Chemie und Biochemie, Freie Universität Berlin ‡Department…