Chemistry News - November 2008 Archives

Proteins strangle cell during division (11/30/2008)

New type of cell division discovered ...> Full Article

Tiny protein provokes healthy bonding between cells (11/30/2008)

Absence of this biological 'spark' linked to cancer's spread ...> Full Article

Molecular partnership controls daily rhythms, body metabolism (11/29/2008)

Implications for understanding connection between metabolism and obesity, diabetes ...> Full Article

Engineers show how tiny cell proteins generate force to 'walk' (11/28/2008)

MIT researchers have shown how a cell motor protein exerts the force to move, enabling functions such as cell division. ...> Full Article

Scientists present 'moving' theory behind bacterial decision-making (11/26/2008)

Biochemists at North Carolina State University have answered a fundamental question of how important bacterial proteins make life-and-death decisions that allow them to function, a finding that could provide a new target for drugs to disrupt bacterial decision-making processes and related diseases. ...> Full Article

Researchers shed new light on catalyzed reactions (11/25/2008)

Technique lets scientists view step-by-step breakdown of water pollutant ...> Full Article

New material could make gases more transportable (11/24/2008)

Chemists at the University of Liverpool have developed a way of converting methane gas into a powder form in order to make it more transportable ...> Full Article

How do bacteria swim? Brown physicists explain (11/23/2008)

Brown University physicists have completed the most detailed study of the swimming patterns of a microbe, showing for the first time how its movement is affected by drag and a phenomenon called Brownian motion. The findings appear online this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. ...> Full Article

New filtering technology has environmental, industrial applications (11/20/2008)

Materials engineers have created a new type of membrane that separates oil from water and, if perfected, might be used for environmental cleanup, water purification and industrial applications. ...> Full Article

Researchers learn how bleach kills bacteria (11/18/2008)

Developed more than 200 years ago and found in households around the world, chlorine bleach is among the most widely used disinfectants, yet scientists never have understood exactly how the familiar product kills bacteria. ...> Full Article

Wasabi receptor can sense ammonia that causes pain (11/17/2008)

A Japanese research group found that the receptor for hot taste of wasabi, Japanese horseradish usually eaten with sushi, can sense alkaline pH caused by a base such as ammonia. ...> Full Article

New catalysts promise faster, cleaner and more efficient research platform (11/17/2008)

Boston College and MIT researchers detail new class of catalysts ...> Full Article

Test identifies toxic platinum and palladium without time-consuming sample pretreatment (11/16/2008)

Fluorogenic solution glows green within four hours when even minute traces of poisonous Pd(II) and Pt(IV) are present ...> Full Article

Acrylic glass made of sugar (11/16/2008)

new enzyme could revolutionise production of plastics ...> Full Article

Luminescence shines new light on proteins (11/15/2008)

A chance discovery by a team of scientists using optical probes means that changes in cells in the human body could now be seen in a completely different light. ...> Full Article

The bonsai effect: Wounded plants make jasmonates, inhibiting cell division, stunting growth (11/12/2008)

Researchers found that when leaves of the model plant Arabidopsis are wounded, cell division in the apical meristem is reduced, growth of the plant is arrested within days, and the new leaves grow to only one-half of their normal size although the size of leaf cells is unaffected. ...> Full Article

Signaling between protein, growth factor is critical for coordinated cell migration (11/11/2008)

Finding has significance for understanding how cancer spreads ...> Full Article

Hydrogen tank lighter than battery (11/10/2008)

Top hydrogen-absorbing metal alloy 60 percent lighter than battery ...> Full Article

Engineer creating more sensitive, safer landmine detectors (11/7/2008)

Engineer is working to enhance the accuracy of a landmine radar system while minimizing the number of false alarms it produces. ...> Full Article

In decision to grow, bacteria follow the crowd (11/6/2008)

When it comes to the decision to wake up and grow, bacterial spores "listen in" to find out what their neighbors are doing and then they follow the crowd, according to a new report. ...> Full Article

Bare bones of crystal growth: Biomolecules enhance metal contents in calcite (11/5/2008)

A finding that a hydrophilic peptide significantly enhances the magnesium-content of calcite is especially meaningful for geologists because Mg-content in carbonates is used as a 'paleo thermometer'. The findings also offer new insights for materials synthesis. ...> Full Article

New type of fuel found in Patagonia fungus (11/5/2008)

A team has found a fungus that produces a new type of diesel fuel they call "myco-diesel." ...> Full Article

Fuels of the future may come from 'ice that burns,' water and sunshine (11/4/2008)

Fuels of the future may come from "the ice that burns," ordinary water, "designer hydrocarbons," and other new sources ...> Full Article

Bacteria manage perfume oil production from grass (11/4/2008)

Scientists in Italy have found bacteria in the root of a tropical grass whose oils have been used in the cosmetic and perfumery industries. ...> Full Article

Solar power game-changer: 'Near perfect' absorption of sunlight, from all angles (11/4/2008)

Researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute have discovered and demonstrated a new method for overcoming two major hurdles facing solar energy. By developing a new antireflective coating that boosts the amount of sunlight captured by solar panels and allows those panels to absorb the entire solar spectrum from nearly any angle, the research team has moved academia and industry closer to realizing high-efficiency, cost-effective solar power. ...> Full Article

Sniffing out a better chemical sensor (11/2/2008)

Marrying a sensitive detector technology capable of distinguishing hundreds of different chemical compounds with a pattern-recognition module that mimics the way animals recognize odors, researchers have created a new approach for 'electronic noses' that is more adept than conventional methodologies at recognizing molecular features even for chemicals it has not been trained to detect. ...> Full Article

Powered by olive stones? Turning waste stones into fuel (11/1/2008)

Olive stones can be turned into bioethanol, a renewable fuel that can be produced from plant matter and used as an alternative to petrol or diesel. This gives the olive processing industry an opportunity to make valuable use of 4 million tons of waste in olive stones it generates every year and sets a precedent for the recycling of waste products as fuels. ...> Full Article