Activating the hidden pharmaceutical potential of bacteria

Researchers develop a new genetic method for the production of new active ingredients in bacteria

17-Dec-2024 - Microorganisms produce a wide variety of natural products that can be used as active ingredients to treat diseases such as infections or cancer. The blueprints for these molecules can be found in the microbes' genes, but often remain inactive under laboratory conditions. A team of researchers at ...

Click & Try: A Failed Experiment and Chance Opened up new Paths to an Established Reaction for Chemists

Freed from the Niche with Click Chemistry

14-Nov-2024 - The original plan was to develop a new ligand, the shell of a catalyst, so to speak. Specifically, the research groups of Dr. habil. Christian Hering-Junghans and Prof. Torsten Beweries at the Rostock LIKAT were to develop a phosphorus-based ligand. However, the syntheses as part of a doctorate ...

Synthesizing fine chemicals: Technological Advance in Production of Pharmaceuticals

04-Oct-2024 - Production of fine chemicals such as those used in pharmaceuticals is typically complex and laborious. An interdisciplinary team of Fraunhofer researchers worked together across different projects to devise a method modeled on a cascade, in which multiple successive stages of synthesis proceed ...

Synthetic biology reveals the secrets of life without oxygen

ERC Advanced Grant for natural product researcher Christian Hertweck

15-Jul-2024 - The “AnoxyGen” project will decode novel active substances of anaerobes and elucidate their role in nature. Some of these could be useful for humans, animals and the environment. Christian Hertweck has been awarded one of the ERC Advanced Grants by the European Research Council (ERC). In the ...

Riddle of proteins in the brain solved

Erin Schuman awarded the Körber European Science Prize, worth one million euros

01-Jul-2024 - The American neurobiologist Erin Schuman is a pioneer in neurobiology. Schuman’s work has revolutionised our understanding of how individual brain cells – so called neurons – work. She discovered that and how proteins, as critical building blocks of the cells, are locally produced at the ...

Novel synthesis of fluorinated molecules with potential in drug research developed

The new synthetic method relies on two fundamentally challenging chemical processes

25-Jun-2024 - A research team from Kiel has described a method for directly converting carbon-hydrogen bonds in carboxylic acids into carbon-fluorine bonds. Carboxylic acids are one of the most important substance classes in chemistry and are a component of many drugs such as aspirin and ibuprofen. To tailor ...

Intricate processes in photosynthesis decoded using advanced electron microscopy technique

This enables breakthroughs in multiple areas of biological and chemical research

25-Jun-2024 - Using cryo-electron microscopy a team of scientists from Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin (HU), the Swedish universities of Umeå and Uppsala and the University of Potsdam has succeeded in visualising atomic structures at an unprecedented resolution at the nanometre level underlying the process of ...

St. John's wort: Important steps of biosynthesis discovered

This opens up the opportunity to obtain the complex ingredients biotechnologically

06-Jun-2024 - St. John's wort is one of the best-known medicinal plants. There are over 500 species worldwide. Its complex ingredients have promising medicinal properties. However, their isolation and synthesis are difficult. Scientists at the Institute of Pharmaceutical Biology at the Technical University of ...

Chemists mimic natural molecular structures: New possibility for vaccine development

Fluorinated sugar molecules as vaccine leads against meningitis B and C

28-May-2024 - Meningococci (Neisseria meningitidis) are disease-causing bacteria that cause life-threatening meningitis, or blood poisoning (septicaemia). There are a number of meningococcal variants worldwide, known as serogroups, and in Germany the Standing Committee on Vaccination (STIKO) recommends ...

Electrochemistry Paves the Way: Sustainable Synthesis Method Reveals N-Hydroxy Modifications for Pharmaceuticals

Closing knowledge gaps - new findings on heterocycles

18-Apr-2024 - New highly selective and scalable electro-organic synthesis of novel benzo[e]-1,2,4-thiadiazine-1,1-dioxides which represent an important structural motif of APIs (active pharmaceutical ingredients) modified with a unique N-hydroxy moiety. Recently published research results enable preparative ...