Making it easier to differentiate mirror-image molecules

Researchers have shown that mirror-image substances – so-called enantiomers – can be better distinguished using helical X-ray light

06-Jul-2022 - Using a new method, scientists are better able to distinguish between mirror-image substances. This is important amongst others in drug development, because the two variants can cause completely different effects in the human body. Researchers from Paul Scherrer Institute PSI, EPF Lausanne ...

Revolutionary images of the birth of crystals

A team from the UNIGE has succeeded in visualizing crystal nucleation - the stage that precedes crystallization - that was invisible until now

26-Apr-2022 - At the interface between chemistry and physics, the process of crystallization is omnipresent in nature and industry. It is the basis for the formation of snowflakes but also of certain active ingredients used in pharmacology. For the phenomenon to occur for a given substance, it must first go ...

Molecular switch detects metals in the environment

Chemical sensor capable of detecting the presence of metals

17-Aug-2018 - An international team, led by researchers from the University of Geneva (UNIGE), Switzerland, has designed a family of molecules capable of binding to metal ions present in its environment and providing an easily detectable light signal during binding. This new type of sensor forms a 3D structure ...

A fresh look inside the protein nano-machines

24-May-2017 - Proteins perform vital functions of life, they digest food and fight infections and cancer. They are in fact nano-machines, each one of them designed to perform a specific task. But how did they evolve to match those needs, how did the genes encode the structure and function of proteins? ...

Screening the most useful nanoparticles for medicine

07-Feb-2017 - The use of nanoparticles -- small, virus-sized elements developed under laboratory conditions -- is increasingly widespread in the world of biomedicine. This rapidly-evolving technology offers hope for many medical applications, whether for diagnosis or therapies. In oncology, for example, the ...

Single enantiomer using copper catalyst

12-Jun-2009 - Chemists in Switzerland show that a racemic mixture can be transformed into one enantiomer, using a copper catalyst. The concept of the dynamic kinetic asymmetric transformation in allylic substitutions represents an efficient methodology for transforming a racemic mixture into one ...

Sequencing the cow's genetic code

28-Apr-2009 - Researchers from the Universities of Geneva and Lausanne, as well as the Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics have been part of a major international project to sequence the bovine (cow) genome, a female Hereford cow named L1 Dominette. Sequencing the bovine genome is now complete, paving the way ...

New synthetic route to oxindoles

12-Aug-2008 - Peter Kündig and colleagues from Geneva University, Switzerland and Stephen Marsden and co-workers at the University of Leeds, in the UK, have developed an asymmetric Pd/N-heterocyclic carbene (NHC) - catalysed intramolecular -arylation of amide enolates, containing heteroatom sustituents. This ...