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Category: chemistry – Page 42

As energy from the sun reaches Earth, some solar radiation is absorbed by the atmosphere, leading to chemical reactions like the formation of ozone and the breakup of gas molecules. A new approach for modeling these reactions, developed by a team led by scientists at Penn State, may improve our understanding of the atmosphere on early Earth and help in the search for habitable conditions on planets beyond our solar system.

The researchers have reported in the journal JGR Atmospheres that using a statistical method called correlated-k can improve existing photochemical models used to understand conditions on early Earth.

The approach can help scientists better understand the atmospheric composition of early Earth and will play an important role as new observatories come online in the coming decades that can provide new data on exoplanet atmospheres, the scientists said.

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Can weight loss leave a lasting imprint on our fat cells?

Losing weight is often touted as a cornerstone of better health, particularly for people dealing with obesity and its associated health risks.

Anyone who has ever tried to get rid of a few extra kilos knows the frustration: the weight drops initially, only to be back within a matter of weeks—the yo-yo effect has struck. Researchers at ETH Zurich have now been able to show that this is all down to epigenetics.

Epigenetics is the part of genetics that’s based not on the sequence of genetic , but on small yet characteristic chemical markers on these building blocks. The sequence of building blocks has evolved over a long period of time; we all inherit them from our parents.

Epigenetic markers, on the other hand, are more dynamic: , our and the condition of our body—such as obesity—can change them over the course of a lifetime. But they can remain stable for many years, sometimes decades, and during this time, they play a key role in determining which genes are active in our cells and which are not.

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Researchers in the Nanoscience Center at the University of Jyväskylä, Finland, have used machine learning and supercomputer simulations to investigate how tiny gold nanoparticles bind to blood proteins. The studies discovered that favorable nanoparticle-protein interactions can be predicted from machine learning models that are trained from atom-scale molecular dynamics simulations. The new methodology opens ways to simulate the efficacy of gold nanoparticles as targeted drug delivery systems in precision nanomedicine.

Hybrid nanostructures between biomolecules and inorganic nanomaterials constitute a largely unexplored field of research, with the potential for novel applications in bioimaging, biosensing, and nanomedicine. Developing such applications relies critically on understanding the dynamical properties of the nano–bio interface.

Modeling the properties of the nano-bio interface is demanding since the important processes such as electronic charge transfer, or restructuring of the biomolecule surface can take place in a wide range of length and time scales, and the atomistic simulations need to be run in the appropriate aqueous environment.

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Researchers from the University of Bonn have trained an AI process to predict potential active ingredients with special properties. Therefore, they derived a chemical language model — a kind of ChatGPT for molecules. Following a training phase, the AI was able to exactly reproduce the chemical structures of compounds with known dual-target activity that may be particularly effective medications. The study has now been published in Cell Reports Physical Science.

Anyone who wants to delight their granny with a poem on her 90th birthday doesn’t need to be a poet nowadays: A short prompt in ChatGPT is all it takes, and within a few seconds the AI spits out a long list of words that rhyme with the birthday girl’s name. It can even produce a sonnet to go with it if you like.

Researchers at the University of Bonn have implemented a similar model in their study — known as a chemical language model. This does not, however, produce rhymes. Instead, the AI displays the structural formulas of chemical compounds that may have a particularly desirable property: They are able to bind to two different target proteins. In the organism, this means, for example, they can inhibit two enzymes at once.

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Water, a molecule essential for life, exhibits unusual properties—referred to as anomalies—that define its behavior. Despite extensive study, many mysteries remain about the molecular mechanisms underlying these anomalies that make water unique. Deciphering and replicating this distinctive behavior across various temperature ranges remains a significant challenge for the scientific community.

Now, a study presents a new theoretical model capable of overcoming the limitations of previous methodologies to understand how water behaves in extreme conditions. The paper, featured on the cover of The Journal of Chemical Physics, is led by Giancarlo Franzese and Luis Enrique Coronas, from the Faculty of Physics and the Institute of Nanoscience and Nanotechnology of the University of Barcelona (IN2UB).

The study not only broadens our understanding of the physics of water, but also has implications for technology, biology and biomedicine, in particular for addressing the treatment of neurodegenerative diseases and the development of advanced biotechnologies.

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YORKTOWN HEIGHTS, N.Y., Nov. 13, 2024 /PRNewswire/ — Today at its inaugural IBM Quantum Developer Conference, IBM (NYSE: IBM) announced quantum hardware and software advancements to execute complex algorithms on IBM quantum computers with record levels of scale, speed, and accuracy.

IBM Quantum Heron, the company’s most performant quantum processor to-date and available in IBM’s global quantum data centers, can now leverage Qiskit to accurately run certain classes of quantum circuits with up to 5,000 two-qubit gate operations. Users can now use these capabilities to expand explorations in how quantum computers can tackle scientific problems across materials, chemistry, life sciences, high-energy physics, and more.

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A research team reports in the journal Angewandte Chemie that gamma radiation can transform methane into a diverse range of products at room temperature, including hydrocarbons, oxygenated molecules, and amino acids. This reaction likely plays a significant role in the formation of complex organic molecules in the universe—and may even contribute to the origins of life. Additionally, it presents new opportunities for industrially converting methane into high-value products under mild conditions.

With these research results, the team led by Weixin Huang at the University of Science and Technology of China (Hefei) has contributed to our fundamental understanding of the early development of molecules in the universe.

“Gamma rays, high-energy photons commonly existing in cosmic rays and unstable isotope decay, provide external energy to drive chemical reactions of simple molecules in the icy mantles of interstellar dust and ice grains,” states Huang. “This can result in more complex organic molecules, presumably starting from methane (CH4), which is widely present throughout the interstellar medium.”

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This study explores how muscle contractions, such as those that occur during exercise, influence motor neurons—the cells responsible for controlling muscle movement.

There’s no doubt that exercise does a body good. Regular activity not only strengthens muscles but can bolster our bones, blood vessels, and immune system.

Now, MIT engineers have found that exercise can also have benefits at the level of individual neurons. They observed that when muscles contract during exercise, they release a soup of biochemical signals called myokines.

In the presence of these -generated signals, neurons grew four times further compared to neurons that were not exposed to myokines. These cellular-level experiments suggest that exercise can have a significant biochemical effect on nerve growth.

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