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BMS to pay big to enter KRAS field

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Bristol Myers Squibb (BMS) has announced it will buy the oncology drug developer Mirati Therapeutics, setting it up to gain Krazati (adagrasib), a KRAS inhibitor that received approval from the US Food and Drug Administration in December 2022. It also gets molecules such as MRTX1719, which is expected to enter Phase 2 clinical trials in the first half of 2024.

“With multiple targeted oncology assets including Krazati, Mirati is another important step forward in our efforts to grow our diversified oncology portfolio,” BMS chief operating officer Chris Boerner says in a statement.

BMS will pay $4.8 billion for Mirati, plus another $1 billion if and when the FDA accepts an application for MRTX1719. That valuation represents a 52% premium on the 30-day average of Mirati’s stock price before reports of a potential takeover began to emerge.

The KRAS protein helps regulate how cells grow and proliferate, but when mutated it has the potential to turn normal cells into cancerous ones. KRAS has thus become a target of interest for drug makers. The first KRAS inhibitor, Lumakras, was developed by Amgen and approved by the FDA in 2021. Krazati is the only other to win approval so far. Both are used to treat non-small-cell lung cancer.

BMS clearly has high hopes for Krazati, though it brought in only $6.3 million during the first three months of 2023, its first quarter on the market. Studies have shown that Krazati has an edge over Amgen’s drug when it comes to efficacy, but Lumakras has the advantage on durability of patient response.

MRTX1719, which is still in trials at Mirati, doesn’t target the KRAS protein. Instead, it deals with the PRMT5 protein—but previous research has detailed the potential for crosstalk between these two proteins.

Although Lumakras and Krazati are the only KRAS inhibitors currently on the market, analysts expect that won’t be the case much longer.

Six other pharmaceutical firms have similar small-molecule drugs at varying stages of clinical trials. This is “the major risk to Krazati’s ability to reach blockbuster status,” wrote Matt Phipps, a research analyst at William Blair, in an Oct. 9 report. Phipps notes that the addition of MRTX1719 to BMS’s product line is promising, but he cautions that Amgen is developing a similar drug, and initial data is expected as soon as Oct. 13.

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October 11, 2023
Starfield structures and gamified instruments

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Credit: Brandon Hacha

Double (bond) vision: When Brandon Hacha saw this molecule, which resembles caffeine but is missing a double bond, he knew he had to act.

Correcting caffeine

Starfield, a new role-playing space opera video game, involves a lot of tropes of the science fiction genre.

“There’s lasers—well, those are real,” says graduate student Brandon Hacha, who, when he’s not playing Starfield, frequently uses lasers in photonics research. “But there are laser guns.”

Starfield designers developed lots of scientific set dressing to add atmosphere to the laboratories and long-abandoned research outposts that players can explore. That decor includes scribbles that Hacha says don’t add up to much but are meant to convey that “some brainy people drew some things up here.” Hacha would know. He took a video call with Newscripts from a seat in front of a whiteboard at the University of Wisconsin–Madison scrawled with exactly such equations—but meaningful. He had been playing the game for less than an hour, he says, when he noticed a problem in the scenery: a caffeine molecule that appeared on several whiteboards was missing a double bond.

As regular readers of Newscripts know, caffeine is a popular artist’s model. Still, as a physical chemist, Hacha wanted to double-check his recollection of the structure. After all, he says, “it’s got a lot of atoms in it.”But after confirming that the molecule pictured had no common name in ChemSpider, he took a screenshot and fixed it in a simple image editor. Then, on a lark, he sent the fix to his friends as a downloadable patch for the game. “It was supposed to be a joke,” Hacha says. So it came as a surprise to him the next morning to find that some 200 other players had downloaded the patch. Then it was picked up by a YouTube influencer who reviews video-game modifications. The patch took off on social media; many people joked that the game was unplayable without that missing double bond.

Even in the game, the molecule is just part of the scenery. “It’s such an insignificant thing that I think that’s why it’s funny,” Hacha says. Bethesda Game Studios, which developed Starfield, did not respond to Newscripts’ requests for comment.

Making data collection fun

Credit: Yang H. Ku/C&EN

High score: Molecular Reality hopes to make data collection fun by building a video game around it.

Most nanopores are fixed in size, and a pore that’s sized to admit DNA is too small for viruses. But the tech start-up Molecular Reality envisions a future when the same nanopore device can sense both. The company is working on a molecular gate that can dilate and contract to accommodate many analytes of different sizes. Kent Kemmish, the start-up’s founder and CEO, tells Newscripts that adjustable pores “have the potential to function as universal molecular sensors.”

Whether fixed or dynamic, nanopore sensors work by detecting changes in current as analytes pass through a pore. The sensors use algorithms trained on known analytes to interpret those changes.

To train its algorithm, Molecular Reality needs to collect reams of data from pores scanning all kinds of analytes in all kinds of environments. It wants to speed up that process, using what Kemmish calls “the world’s first scientific instrument control software that’s also a game.”

The game will encourage players to seek out unidentified signal-producing objects, or USPOs, from the natural and built environment to use in battle against other players. Though the game has yet to be released, about a thousand nanopore enthusiasts are already on the wait list for notifications, Kemmish says.

The game will be called Maxine’s Quest. Its mascot, Maxine, draws her name from the Maxwell’s demon thought experiment, which imagines a system for reversing entropy by selectively letting only certain molecules through a very small gate. The company used to be called Demonpore, but “we kind of backed off of that name because there were, like, borderline kind of death threats,” Kemmish says. “It just led to the wrong kind of energy.”

Please send comments and suggestions to [email protected].

Chemical & Engineering News

ISSN 0009-2347

Copyright © 2024 American Chemical Society

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October 11, 2023
Carbon dioxide industry stresses about supply

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Carbon dioxide is a foe in the fight against climate change, but it’s also an essential material for several critical industries, including refrigeration, food, and beverages. Shortages in recent years caused by the pandemic and the war in Ukraine already have gas traders, equipment makers, and users stressed. Now the industry is concerned that CO₂ sequestration will squeeze supplies even further.

About 75% of the US CO₂ market, excluding uses by the oil and gas industry, is supplied by CO₂ generated from making ethanol, ammonia, and hydrogen. But new mandates and tax credits are creating an economic incentive for companies to inject their CO₂ underground for sequestration instead. In many cases, the tax credits price traditional buyers out, a market distortion that has users and suppliers worried about getting what they need.

At the North American CO₂ Summit, hosted in Indianapolis last month by the publishing group Gasworld, Rich Gottwald, CEO of the Compressed Gas Association (CGA), urged attendees to become more vocal with the public and policymakers about their needs and contributions. CO₂ was cheap and readily available for a long time, he said, and the industry was able to go about its business without much fuss. “Being invisible no longer serves our best interests,” Gottwald said.

The CGA is lobbying the US Congress for tax code changes that would give CO₂ use as much in tax credits as sequestration gets. Gottwald told C&EN that his group does not represent fossil fuel companies, which use CO₂ to force oil and natural gas out of otherwise-depleted wells, and it has no position on that use of CO₂.

New sources of CO₂ are coming online, including expanded capture at factories and power plants and capture of by-product from biomethane facilities. But Gottwald expects the vast majority will be sequestered. That could be fine, he said, if what’s not sequestered can get to the industries that need it.

At the conference, Jeff Holyoak, vice president for sales and market development at the CO₂ and dry ice equipment seller TomCO₂ Systems, summed up the industry sentiment: “CO₂ is too important to the economy to stick in the ground.”

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October 11, 2023
Experiment: Kimchi chemistry

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acidic: An adjective for materials that contain acid. Acidic materials often are capable of dissolving away some minerals such as carbonate, or preventing their formation in the first place.

aerospace: A research field devoted to the study of Earth’s atmosphere and the space beyond or to aircraft that travel in the atmosphere and space.

agent: A person or thing (it can be a chemical or even a form of energy) that plays some role in getting something done.

anaerobic: Occurring in the absence of oxygen. Anaerobic reactions take place in oxygen-free locations.

astronaut: Someone trained to travel into space for research and exploration.

average: (in science) A term for the arithmetic mean, which is the sum of a group of numbers that is then divided by the size of the group.

bacteria: (singular: bacterium) Single-celled organisms. These dwell nearly everywhere on Earth, from the bottom of the sea to inside other living organisms (such as plants and animals). Bacteria are one of the three domains of life on Earth.

biochemical: (adj.) Referring to something made and used within living things.

carbohydrates: Any of a large group of compounds occurring in foods and living tissues, including sugars, starch and cellulose. They contain hydrogen and oxygen in the same ratio as water (2:1) and typically can be broken down in an animal’s body to release energy.

cell: (in biology) The smallest structural and functional unit of an organism. Typically too small to see with the unaided eye, it consists of a watery fluid surrounded by a membrane or wall. Depending on their size, animals are made of anywhere from thousands to trillions of cells. Most organisms, such as yeasts, molds, bacteria and some algae, are composed of only one cell.

chemical: A substance formed from two or more atoms that unite (bond) in a fixed proportion and structure. For example, water is a chemical made when two hydrogen atoms bond to one oxygen atom. Its chemical formula is H₂O. Chemical also can be an adjective to describe properties of materials that are the result of various reactions between different compounds.

concentration: (in chemistry) A measurement of how much of one substance has been dissolved into another.

data: Facts and/or statistics collected together for analysis but not necessarily organized in a way that gives them meaning. For digital information (the type stored by computers), those data typically are numbers stored in a binary code, portrayed as strings of zeros and ones.

diffusion: The process of spreading out thinly over a great area. It can involve the release or movement of light or some substance through a liquid (such as water or air) or through some surface (such as a membrane).

equation: In mathematics, the statement that two quantities are equal. In geometry, equations are often used to determine the shape of a curve or surface.

factor: Something that plays a role in a particular condition or event; a contributor.

fermentation: (v. ferment) The metabolic process of converting carbohydrates (sugars and starches) into short-chain fatty acids, gases or alcohol. Yeast and bacteria are central to the process of fermentation. Fermentation is a process used to liberate nutrients from food in the human gut. It also is an underlying process used to make alcoholic beverages, from wine and beer to stronger spirits.

flavor: The particular mix of sensations that help people recognize something that has passed through the mouth. This is based largely on how a food or drink is sensed by cells in the mouth. It also can be influenced, to some extent, by its smell, look or texture.

fungus: (plural: fungi) One of a group of single- or multiple-celled organisms that reproduce via spores and feed on living or decaying organic matter. Examples include mold, yeasts and mushrooms.

glucose: A simple sugar that is an important energy source in living organisms. As an energy source moving through the bloodstream, it is known as “blood sugar.” It is half of the molecule that makes up table sugar (also known as sucrose).

lactic acid: A chemical compound commonly found in milk and in exercising muscles.

liquid: A material that flows freely but keeps a constant volume, like water or oil.

membrane: A barrier which blocks the passage (or flow through) of some materials depending on their size or other features. Membranes are an integral part of filtration systems. Many serve that same function as the outer covering of cells or organs of a body.

microorganism: A living thing that is too small to see with the unaided eye, including bacteria, some fungi and many other organisms such as amoebas. Most consist of a single cell.

molecule: An electrically neutral group of atoms that represents the smallest possible amount of a chemical compound. Molecules can be made of single types of atoms or of different types. For example, the oxygen in the air is made of two oxygen atoms (O₂), but water is made of two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom (H₂O).

monitor: To test, sample or watch something, especially on a regular or ongoing basis.

organism: Any living thing, from elephants and plants to bacteria and other types of single-celled life.

osmosis: The movement of certain molecules within a solution across a membrane. The movement is always from the solution where the concentration of some chemical is higher to the solution where the concentration of that chemical is lower. This movement tends to continue until concentrations on each side of the membrane are the same.

oxygen: A gas that makes up about 21 percent of Earth’s atmosphere. All animals and many microorganisms need oxygen to fuel their growth (and metabolism).

pH: A measure of a solution’s acidity or alkalinity. A pH of 7 is perfectly neutral. Acids have a pH lower than 7; the farther from 7, the stronger the acid. Alkaline solutions, called bases, have a pH higher than 7; again, the farther above 7, the stronger the base.

polyethylene: A plastic made from chemicals that have been refined (produced from) crude oil and/or natural gas. The most common plastic in the world, it is flexible and tough. It also can resist radiation.

range: The full extent or distribution of something. For instance, a plant or animal’s range is the area over which it naturally exists. (in math or for measurements) The extent to which values can vary (such as the highest to lowest temperatures). Also, the distance within which something can be reached or perceived.

salt: A compound made by combining an acid with a base (in a reaction that also creates water). The ocean contains many different salts — collectively called “sea salt.” Common table salt is a made of sodium and chlorine.

solution: A liquid in which one chemical has been dissolved into another.

synthesis: (v. synthesize) The production of a substance by the combining of simpler chemical building blocks.

taste: One of the basic properties the body uses to sense its environment, especially foods, using receptors (taste buds) on the tongue (and some other organs).

unique: Something that is unlike anything else; the only one of its kind.

yeast: One-celled fungi that can ferment carbohydrates (like sugars), producing carbon dioxide and alcohol. They also play a pivotal role in making many baked products rise.

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October 11, 2023
Measuring protocol sharing: are we on the right track?

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Written by Marcel LaFlamme

For almost a year, Open Science Indicators have offered the ability to measure three Open Science practices: data sharing, code sharing, and preprint posting. Now, PLOS and DataSeer are adding a fourth indicator for protocol sharing. As we expand the tool’s capabilities, we invite your feedback on the approach we’ve taken in this preliminary data release.

What is a protocol?

The word protocol means different things in different fields, so first we want to clearly signal what types of research output are in scope for this indicator. In line with the community-developed definition used in the PRO-MaP recommendations, we are defining protocol as “detailed and/or step-by-step instructions for carrying out a research procedure.” Clinical study protocols, review protocols, registered report protocols, and other protocols describing a study that will take place in the future generally do not meet this definition, although we’re currently scoping work on a fifth indicator that is likely to include these outputs.

How we got here

In 2022, PLOS conducted a study of researcher practices and priorities around sharing detailed methods information including protocols. The study found that, while methods sections of research articles are regarded as adequate for evaluating study findings, they are not widely perceived as adequate for reproducing results or reusing a method in a different context. To ensure that methods information is usable for a range of research tasks, study participants reported publicly sharing protocols through channels including peer-reviewed publications, supplementary information, dedicated repositories, and other websites.

With these results in mind, we drafted a set of requirements built on our OSI measurement framework and consulted on them with stakeholders including tool providers, meta-researchers, and other methods experts. We then worked with DataSeer to operationalize the requirements. Our current approach detects links to or citations of outputs from an allowlist of publications and repositories known to focus on protocols. In keeping with our approach to measuring data and code sharing, we also detect relevant metadata from supplementary information where available. Please consult our methods documentation for more detail.

What the data say

From 2019 through mid-2023, the rate of protocol sharing for research articles published in PLOS journals hovered around 8%. In contrast to trends in other Open Science practices over the same period, adoption of protocol sharing by PLOS authors did not appear to change appreciably – according to these preliminary results. We assume that not all articles generate protocols, but the rate of protocol generation was not calculated for this release.

Among a comparator set of about 18,000 Open Access research articles from PubMed Central, the rate of protocol sharing did appear to increase from 10% in 2019 to 15% in the first half of 2023. Additional qualitative research may help to explain why these trendlines diverge, whether because of limitations in our data sources or actual differences in author behavior.

Preliminary analysis of the locations of protocols associated with PLOS articles indicates that a clear majority (84%) appear as peer-reviewed publications, with Nature Protocols and the Springer Protocols collection as the most cited sources. Sharing in dedicated repositories like protocols.io and Protocol Exchange became less common over the reporting period, falling from 11% in 2019 to 2% in the first half of 2023, while sharing via supplementary information became more common. The use of repositories is often viewed as a best practice for protocol sharing because these protocols can be updated as they evolve over time.

What’s next

Our roadmap for further developing the protocols indicator includes adding detection of protocols on lab websites and other online locations. We plan to look more deeply at citations of published protocols, so that we can understand the extent to which authors are pointing to procedures actually used in their study as opposed to referencing protocols for some other reason. We also want to be able to assess how often researchers share their own protocols versus protocols created by others.

Just as importantly, we’d like to hear from you: are there publications or repositories missing from our allowlist? How should we address the limitations of an allowlist-based approach? And are there other ways of communicating detailed methods information that we should consider? We’d be grateful for your input by November 15; you can comment below or write to mlaflamme [at] plos.org to share your perspective.

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October 10, 2023
Scientists Say: Supercool

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atmosphere: The envelope of gases surrounding Earth, another planet or a moon.

atom: The basic unit of a chemical element. Atoms are made up of a dense nucleus that contains positively charged protons and uncharged neutrons. The nucleus is orbited by a cloud of negatively charged electrons.

chemical: A substance formed from two or more atoms that unite (bond) in a fixed proportion and structure. For example, water is a chemical made when two hydrogen atoms bond to one oxygen atom. Its chemical formula is H₂O. Chemical also can be an adjective to describe properties of materials that are the result of various reactions between different compounds.

cloud: A plume of molecules or particles, such as water droplets, that move under the action of an outside force, such as wind, radiation or water currents. (in atmospheric science) A mass of airborne water droplets and ice crystals that travel as a plume, usually high in Earth’s atmosphere. Its movement is driven by winds.

comet: A celestial object consisting of a nucleus of ice and dust. When a comet passes near the sun, gas and dust vaporize off the comet’s surface, creating its trailing “tail.”

crystal: (adj. crystalline) A solid consisting of a symmetrical, ordered, three-dimensional arrangement of atoms or molecules. It’s the organized structure taken by most minerals. Apatite, for example, forms six-sided crystals. The crystalline components of a rock are usually too small to be seen with the unaided eye.

liquid: A material that flows freely but keeps a constant volume, like water or oil.

matter: Something that occupies space and has mass. Anything on Earth with matter will have a property described as “weight.”

molecule: An electrically neutral group of atoms that represents the smallest possible amount of a chemical compound. Molecules can be made of single types of atoms or of different types. For example, the oxygen in the air is made of two oxygen atoms (O₂), but water is made of two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom (H₂O).

organ: (in biology) Various parts of an organism that perform one or more particular functions. For instance, an ovary is an organ that makes eggs, the brain is an organ that makes sense of nerve signals and a plant’s roots are organs that take in nutrients and moisture.

protein: A compound made from one or more long chains of amino acids. Proteins are an essential part of all living organisms. They form the basis of living cells, muscle and tissues; they also do the work inside of cells. Antibodies, hemoglobin and enzymes are all examples of proteins. Medicines frequently work by latching onto proteins.

salt: A compound made by combining an acid with a base (in a reaction that also creates water). The ocean contains many different salts — collectively called “sea salt.” Common table salt is a made of sodium and chlorine.

sea: An ocean (or region that is part of an ocean). Unlike lakes and streams, seawater — or ocean water — is salty.

solid: Firm and stable in shape; not liquid or gaseous.

supercool: An adjective for a liquid or a gas that has been slowly cooled to below its freezing point without it becoming a solid.

supercooled: Adjective for some liquid or gas that has been cooled to below its freezing point without it becoming a solid.

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October 9, 2023
Your Zoom background might influence the first impression you make

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In a new PLOS ONE study researchers found that participants tended to judge faces appearing against backgrounds featuring houseplants or bookcases as more trustworthy and competent than faces with a living space or a novelty image behind them. Gender and facial expression also appeared to influence judgments. Learn more about the findings in our Research Highlight summary below or read the full article in PLOS ONE.

Background

Prior research has demonstrated that first impressions can make a real difference in people’s lives; for example, they can influence criminal sentencing decisions or choices of romantic partners. In recent years, a major increase in video conferencing has resulted in many first impressions of others now occurring virtually. Popular video conferencing platforms let users customize their background image. However, few studies have explored how background choice might influence first impressions.

Sample Stimuli: A) Happy female on plants background B) Happy male on bookcase background C) Happy female on home background D) Neutral male on blurred home background E Neutral female on blank background F) Neutral male on novelty background. Cook et al., 2023, PLOS ONE, CC-BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) Image Link: https://plos.io/3sSHlgS

Study Design and Findings

Researchers Paddy Ross, Abi Cook, and Meg Thompson at Durham University, UK asked 167 adults to view still images that appeared to have been captured during a videoconference. Each image showed the face of a man or woman, either smiling or with a neutral expression, against a background featuring a living space, a blurred living space, houseplants, a bookcase, a blank wall, or a novelty image of a walrus on an iceberg. Participants reported how competent and trustworthy they perceived each face to be

Statistical analysis showed that participants rated faces against the houseplant and bookcase backgrounds as being more trustworthy and competent than faces with other backgrounds. Faces against a living space or novelty image were rated as the least competent or trustworthy.

Participants tended to perceive happy faces as more trustworthy and competent than neutral faces. They also perceived female faces as more trustworthy and competent overall. However, among female faces, those with the living-space background were perceived as no less trustworthy than those with houseplants or a bookcase, suggesting that the lower trustworthiness associated with the living-space background were primarily driven by male faces.

Further Insights

More research is needed to confirm these findings and examine whether they apply across cultural contexts—for instance, the image database used in the study primarily featured white individuals. Nonetheless, they suggest that videoconference users concerned with making a good impression, especially men, might smile and choose a background with houseplants or a bookcase.

The authors add: “This research shows how our Zoom backgrounds can affect the first impressions we make. If you want to come across as trustworthy and competent there are some backgrounds you should use and some you should definitely avoid.”

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October 6, 2023
Creation of quantum dots wins 2023 chemistry Nobel

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application: A particular use or function of something.

atom: The basic unit of a chemical element. Atoms are made up of a dense nucleus that contains positively charged protons and uncharged neutrons. The nucleus is orbited by a cloud of negatively charged electrons.

biomedical: Having to do with medicine and how it interacts with cells or tissues.

biomedical engineer: An expert who uses science and math to find solutions to problems in biology and medicine; for example, they might create medical devices such as artificial knees.

cell: (in biology) The smallest structural and functional unit of an organism. Typically too small to see with the unaided eye, it consists of a watery fluid surrounded by a membrane or wall. Depending on their size, animals are made of anywhere from thousands to trillions of cells. Most organisms, such as yeasts, molds, bacteria and some algae, are composed of only one cell.

chemical: A substance formed from two or more atoms that unite (bond) in a fixed proportion and structure. For example, water is a chemical made when two hydrogen atoms bond to one oxygen atom. Its chemical formula is H₂O. Chemical also can be an adjective to describe properties of materials that are the result of various reactions between different compounds.

chemistry: The field of science that deals with the composition, structure and properties of substances and how they interact. Scientists use this knowledge to study unfamiliar substances, to reproduce large quantities of useful substances or to design and create new and useful substances. (about compounds) Chemistry also is used as a term to refer to the recipe of a compound, the way it’s produced or some of its properties. People who work in this field are known as chemists.

colleague: Someone who works with another; a co-worker or team member.

copper: A metallic chemical element in the same family as silver and gold. Because it is a good conductor of electricity, it is widely used in electronic devices.

crystal: (adj. crystalline) A solid consisting of a symmetrical, ordered, three-dimensional arrangement of atoms or molecules. It’s the organized structure taken by most minerals. Apatite, for example, forms six-sided crystals. The crystalline components of a rock are usually too small to be seen with the unaided eye.

electricity: A flow of charge, usually from the movement of negatively charged particles, called electrons.

engineer: A person who uses science and math to solve problems. As a verb, to engineer means to design a device, material or process that will solve some problem or unmet need.

flu: Short for influenza. It is a highly contagious viral infection of the respiratory passages causing fever and severe aching. It often occurs as an epidemic.

fluorescent: (v. fluoresce) Adjective for something that is capable of absorbing and reemitting light. That reemitted light is known as fluorescence.

glass: A hard, brittle substance made from silica, a mineral found in sand. Glass usually is transparent and fairly inert (chemically nonreactive). Aquatic organisms called diatoms build their shells of it.

HIV: (short for Human Immunodeficiency Virus) A potentially deadly virus that attacks cells in the body’s immune system and causes acquired immune deficiency syndrome, or AIDS.

immune system: The collection of cells and their responses that help the body fight off infections and deal with foreign substances that may provoke allergies.

infectious: An adjective that describes a type of microbe or virus that can be transmitted to people, animals or other living things.

LED: (short for light emitting diode) Electronic components that, as their name suggests, emit light when electricity flows through them. LEDs are very energy-efficient and often can be very bright. They have lately been replacing conventional lights for home and commercial lamps.

link: A connection between two people or things.

matter: Something that occupies space and has mass. Anything on Earth with matter will have a property described as “weight.”

mechanics: The study of how things move.

metal: Something that conducts electricity well, tends to be shiny (reflective) and is malleable (meaning it can be reshaped with heat and not too much force or pressure).

molecule: An electrically neutral group of atoms that represents the smallest possible amount of a chemical compound. Molecules can be made of single types of atoms or of different types. For example, the oxygen in the air is made of two oxygen atoms (O₂), but water is made of two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom (H₂O).

Nobel prize: A prestigious award named after Alfred Nobel. Best known as the inventor of dynamite, Nobel was a wealthy man when he died on December 10, 1896. In his will, Nobel left much of his fortune to create prizes to those who have done their best for humanity in the fields of physics, chemistry, physiology or medicine, literature and peace. Winners receive a medal and large cash award.

particle: A minute amount of something.

physicist: A scientist who studies the nature and properties of matter and energy.

quantum: (pl. quanta) A term that refers to the smallest amount of anything, especially of energy or subatomic mass.

quantum dot: A nanoparticle of semiconducting material (meaning one with dimensions measured on the scale of billionths of a meter). It is inserted into cells, organisms or electronic materials, where it can be used as a label (tag) or to turn trigger some function (such as the production of sterilizing chemicals).

quantum mechanics: A branch of physics dealing with the behavior of matter on the scale of atoms or subatomic particles.

rainbow: An arc of color displayed across the sky during or just after a rain. It’s caused when water droplets in the atmosphere bend (or diffract) white sunlight into a number of its component hues: usually red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet.

range: The full extent or distribution of something. For instance, a plant or animal’s range is the area over which it naturally exists.

semiconductor: A material that sometimes conducts electricity. Semiconductors are important parts of computer chips and certain new electronic technologies, such as light-emitting diodes.

society: An integrated group of people or animals that generally cooperate and support one another for the greater good of them all.

solar: Having to do with the sun or the radiation it emits. It comes from sol, Latin for sun.

solution: A liquid in which one chemical has been dissolved into another.

subtly: An adverb to describe something that may be important, but can be hard to see or describe. For instance, the first cellular changes that signal the start of a cancer may be only subtly different — as in small and hard to distinguish from nearby healthy tissues.

synthesis: (v. synthesize) The production of a substance by the combining of simpler chemical building blocks.

system: A network of parts that together work to achieve some function. For instance, the blood, vessels and heart are primary components of the human body’s circulatory system. Similarly, trains, platforms, tracks, roadway signals and overpasses are among the potential components of a nation’s railway system. System can even be applied to the processes or ideas that are part of some method or ordered set of procedures for getting a task done.

tag: (in cell biology) The attachment of a chemical that stains a cell (or cell part) or that glows when a certain wavelength of light hits it. (in immunology) A chemical change that allows the immune system to identify cells or other material that it should attack and disable or remove.

tagging: (in biology) Attaching some rugged band or package of instruments onto an animal. Sometimes the tag is used to give each individual a unique identification number. Once attached to the leg, ear or other part of the body of a critter, it can effectively become the animal’s “name.” In some instances, a tag can collect information from the environment around the animal as well. This helps scientists understand both the environment and the animal’s role within it.

technology: The application of scientific knowledge for practical purposes, especially in industry — or the devices, processes and systems that result from those efforts.

theoretical: An adjective for an analysis or assessment of something that based on pre-existing knowledge of how things behave. It is not based on experimental trials. Theoretical research tends to use math — usually performed by computers — to predict how or what will occur for some specified series of conditions. Experimental testing or observations of natural systems will then be needed to confirm what had been predicted.

tissue: Made of cells, it is any of the distinct types of materials that make up animals, plants or fungi. Cells within a tissue work as a unit to perform a particular function in living organisms. Different organs of the human body, for instance, often are made from many different types of tissues.

tumor: A mass of cells characterized by atypical and often uncontrolled growth. Benign tumors will not spread; they just grow and cause problems if they press against or tighten around healthy tissue. Malignant tumors will ultimately shed cells that can seed the body with new tumors. Malignant tumors are also known as cancers.

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October 4, 2023
The development of quantum dots wins the 2023 Nobel prize in chemistry

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Work on tiny dots that light up TV screens and help doctors see the blood vessels that feed tumors has earned three scientists the 2023 Nobel Prize in chemistry.

Chemist Moungi Bawendi, chemist Louis Brus and physicist Alexei Ekimov split the prize for the discovery and synthesis of quantum dots, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences announced October 4.

Chemist Moungi Bawendi (left), chemist Louis Brus (middle) and physicist Alexei Ekimov (right) have split the 2023 Nobel Prize in chemistry for “the discovery and development of quantum dots, nanoparticles so tiny that their size determines their properties.”MIT, Columbia University, Nexdot

“Quantum dots are a new class of materials, different from molecules,” said Heiner Linke, a member of the Nobel committee. Just adjusting the size of these nanoparticles, roughly a few billionths of a meter across, can change their properties — optical, electric, magnetic, even melting points — thanks to quantum mechanics (SN: 6/29/15).

That’s also true of color. “If you want to make different colors with molecules, you would choose a new molecule, a new set of atoms” arranged in a different structure, Linke said. But quantum dots of different colors have the exact same arrangement of atoms. The only difference is particle size.

When quantum dots are irradiated by light, electrons within get energized, eventually releasing that energy as fluorescent light. The smaller the dots are, the more they compress the wave function of an electron, increasing its energy so that the dot appears blue. Larger dots appear red.

Dots of the same size made from different materials may also emit slightly different wavelengths of light, says Jean-Marc Pecourt, a chemist at CAS, a division of the American Chemical Society. Quantum dots are usually made from semiconductor materials, such as graphene, selenite or metal sulfides, Pecourt says. So by adjusting materials or the size of quantum dots, chemists can alter their properties for a wide variety of uses.

The idea that the size of these nanoparticles could alter their properties was predicted nearly a century ago, but at the time it seemed impossible to reproduce that effect in the real world. To do that, researchers would need a perfectly crystalline material, and would need to control the size of the nanomaterial very precisely, sculpting it atom layer by atom layer.

Then, in the early 1980s, Ekimov and Brus independently showed that it could be done. Ekimov, now at Nanocrystals Technology, Inc., in Briarcliff Manor, N.Y., demonstrated this in glass, adding copper chloride to produce tiny crystals and revealing that the color of the glass was linked to the size of those crystals. Brus, of Columbia University, made a similar discovery, but in a different context: He demonstrated the link between size and color for nanoparticles floating freely in a solution and in gaseous compounds (SN: 10/3/92).

Those discoveries triggered intense interest in how to harness these little dots for a variety of applications. But manufacturing them would require being able to control the size of the particles to precise specifications.

A decade later, Bawendi, of MIT, developed a method to precisely control the speed of the crystals’ growth in a solution, figuring out how to stop them right when they reach a desired size. He did this by first injecting chemical reagents into the solution that instantaneously formed the tiny crystals and then promptly adjusting the temperature of the solution, halting their growth.

“I’m deeply honored and surprised and shocked by the announcement this morning,” Bawendi said October 4 during an MIT news conference. “I’m especially honored to share this with Lou Brus, who was my postdoctoral mentor [from] whom I learned so much. I tried to emulate his scholarship and his mentoring style as a professor myself when I came to MIT.”

Bawendi started working on quantum dots after he met Brus at Nokia Bell Labs, headquartered in Murray Hill, N.J. The researchers needed high quality quantum dots to study the physics of the nanoparticles, Bawendi said. “It wasn’t because I wanted to make the best quantum dots possible for application, it was because we needed to make the best possible quantum dots to study them.” It took years of trial and error to work out the method, he said.

By making it possible to manufacture quantum dots, Bawendi’s method opened up a world of possible uses for the nanoparticles. Quantum dots make it possible to very precisely change the color of LED lights and dramatically improve their efficiency. Dots that glow with fluorescent light, injected into the body and attached to immune cells that swarm to cancerous tissues, can help surgeons distinguish even hard-to-see tumors (SN: 8/3/04). The ability to be tuned to absorb different wavelengths of light could also allow the manufacture of customized solar cells that are highly efficient in different light conditions. The dots might also be used to build quantum computers, Pecourt says (SN: 2/14/18).

Biomedical engineer and chemist Warren Chan says the prize is well deserved. “They’re the ones who built the foundation,” says Chan, of the University of Toronto. “I’m really happy that the field is getting credit for really changing the world, not just in quantum dots, but in a lot of different areas.”

One of the first applications came in the late 1990s when Chan and colleagues used quantum dots to tag cells in the lab, he says. “The surface modifications that were used for integrating quantum dots for applications were then also adapted for other types of nanoparticles.”

The Nobel committee looks not only at past contributions, but also the effect a discovery may have on the future, Chan says. The ability to tune nanoparticles by changing their size or surface properties could open a wide variety of possibilities that have not yet been explored. Chan and colleagues are now using quantum dots to detect infectious diseases, including HIV, influenza and hepatitis B.

“I was absolutely thrilled to see this,” says Judith Giordan, president of the American Chemical Society. “We have three people recognized who brought this technology from a dream, a hope, a theoretical construct … all the way through synthesis and manufacture.”

Earlier this week, the development of mRNA vaccines — widely speculated as a candidate for the 2023 chemistry Nobel Prize — received the Nobel in medicine or physiology instead (SN: 10/2/23).

“Sometimes chemistry gets a bad rap,” Giordan says. “But here are two magnificent examples of how chemistry has solved problems in the world.”

The three winners will share the prize of 11 million Swedish kronor, or about $1 million.

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October 4, 2023
Why the next solar eclipses are a unique chance to understand the sun’s mysterious corona

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Filtered photos of the sun during an eclipse reveal stunning colours

S. Habbal/M. Druckmüller/Nasa

IN AUGUST 2017, scientists sailed a boat off South Carolina equipped with a weather balloon. The plan was to float it above the clouds for a guaranteed view of an impending total solar eclipse. Then, a terrible storm struck. “They were mostly trying to keep the boat from capsizing,” says Angela Des Jardins, a physicist at Montana State University who leads the Nationwide Eclipse Ballooning Project.

The team behind this project had launched 55 balloons across the US in total. As these popped and parachuted back to Earth, many got caught in trees. It took weeks to get them back. “This time,” says Des Jardins, “we’re giving everyone a special tree pole.”

After a six-year wait, the next total solar eclipse over the US is almost here. First comes a practice run. On 14 October, an annular solar eclipse will see almost all of the sun blocked by the moon, leaving just a “ring of fire”. Then, on 8 April 2024, the real deal arrives – a total eclipse visible over a narrow strip of North America.

The latter offers a chance to see part of the sun usually hidden from view: its wispy, mysterious outer atmosphere, known as the corona. This is the birthplace of the solar wind that travels through our patch of space, sometimes causing aurorae and disrupting satellites. But we understand very little about it. The coming eclipses offer a unique, if fleeting, opportunity to study it. Over the past few years, researchers have been…

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October 2, 2023

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