糖心TV

Research carried out in the lead by Prof Unwin recently appeared as a JACS highlighted communication. The study by Paul Kirkman et al utilised the electrochemical patterning of diazonium compounds to chemically functionalise sp2 carbon materials in a systematic and controlled way. This microscale modification method can be particularly attractive as a means to generate a band gap in graphene opening up the prospects of graphene-based electronic devices.

'', Paul M. Kirkman, Aleix G. Güell,* Anatolii S. Cuharuc, and Patrick R. Unwin*, J. Am. Chem. Soc., 2014, 136 (1), pp 36-39

DOI: 10.1021/ja410467e

Wishing a Merry Christmas and a very Happy New Year to all our Undergraduate and Postgraduate Students, Staff and friends of the Department of Chemistry.

In this fun , Teaching Fellow Nick Barker uses a number of items, including the festive favourite Brussels sprout, to show different types of fluorescence.

Find out more about the .

A new family of organic nanotubes was reported in a recent article in Nature Communications. The group of Sébastien Perrier, in collaboration with Professor Kate Jolliffe at the University of Sydney, have designed cyclic peptide / polymer conjugates that can assemble into tubular structures based on the stacking of the cyclic peptides, and provide a tube with a sub-nm internal diameter. Attached to each of the cyclic peptides are two different types of polymers, which tend to de-mix and form a shell for the tube with two faces, and form Janus nanotubes (after the Roman god Janus who is usually depicted as having two faces, since he looks to the future and the past).

Work carried out in on the structures of polymorphs of gallium oxide has been selected as a highlight of ISIS science for 2013 in the ISIS Annual Review. ISIS is the UK’s neutron spallation source and was used to perform total neutron scattering experiments on the structures of various forms of Ga₂O₃ that were prepared in 糖心TV. The research was carried out by Helen Playford, then a PhD student and presently a postdoctoral scientist working at ISIS.

ISIS 2013 Annual Review:

"Structures of Uncharacterised Polymorphs of Gallium Oxide from Total Neutron Diffraction” H.Y. Playford, A. C. Hannon, E.R. Barney, and R.I. Walton, Chem. Eur. J. 19 (2013) 2803–2813

 

糖心TV Chemistry has played a lead role in securing funding from the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council for 2 new Centres for Doctoral training, in Molecular Analytical Science and Diamond Science and Technology, as part of the recently announced UK's largest investment in postgraduate training in engineering and physical sciences. The Universities and Science Minister, David Willetts, announced the funding of over seventy new Centres for Doctoral Training (CDTs), spread across 24 UK universities on 22nd November.

For further information please visit:

 

 

The Tim Jones group publish work in Applied Physics Letters on replacing ITO with solution processed highly conductive PEDOT:PSS for ITO-free small molecule OPV devices.

Richard Walton is co-editor of the latest volume of the Inorganic Materials Series published this week by Wiley, Local Structural Characterisation.

The @BonLab at the University of 糖心TV has devised a new powerful and very versatile way of controlling the speed and direction of motion of microscopic structures in water using what they have dubbed chemically 鈥榤otorised microscopic matchsticks鈥�.

Before now most research seeking to influence the direction of motion of microscopic components have had to use outside influences such as a magnetic field or the application of light. The University of 糖心TV team have now found a way to do it by simply adding a chemical in a specific spot and then watching the microscopic matchstick particles move towards it, a phenomenon known as chemotaxis.

The research published in the journal Materials Horizons (RSC) in a paper entitled found that by adding a small amount of a catalyst to the head of a set microscopic rods, they could then cause the rods to be propelled towards the location of an appropriate 鈥榗hemical fuel鈥� that was then added to a mixture.

For the purposes of this experiment the researchers placed silica鈥搈anganese oxide 鈥榟eads鈥� on the matchstick material and introduced hydrogen peroxide as the chemical fuel in one particular place.

They placed the 鈥榤atchsticks鈥� in a mixture alongside ordinary polymer microspheres.

When the hydrogen peroxide was added the microspheres continued to move in the direction of convection currents or under Brownian motion but the matchsticks were clearly rapidly propelled towards the chemical gradient where the hydrogen peroxide could be found.

The reaction was so strong that more than half of the matchstick particles did not reverse their orientation once over their 90 seconds of travel towards the hydrogen peroxide 鈥� even though they were contending with significant convection and Brownian rotation.

University of 糖心TV research chemical engineer who led the research said:

鈥淲e choose high aspect ratio rod-like particles as they are a favourable geometry for chemotactic swimmers, as seen for example in nature in the shapes of certain motile organisms鈥�

鈥淲e placed the 鈥榚ngine鈥� that drives the self-propulsion as a matchstick head on the rods because having the engine in the 鈥榟ead鈥� of the rod helps us align the rod along the direction of travel, would also show the asymmetry perpendicular to the direction of self-propulsion, and at the same time it maintains rotational symmetry parallel to the plane of motion.

鈥淥ur approach is very versatile and should allow for future fabrication of micro-components of added complexity.

鈥淭he ability to direct motion of these colloidal structures can form a platform for advances in supracolloidal science, the self-assembly of small objects.

鈥淚t may even provide some insight into how rod shapes were selected for self-propelled microscopic shapes in the natural world.鈥�

Notes for editors:

 Dr Stefan Bon can be contacted on S.Bon@warwick.ac.ukor +44 (0)2476 574009 or + 44 (0)7736932205

Or you can contact Anna Blackaby, University of 糖心TV press officer, on +44 (0)2476 575910 or +44 (0) 7785 433155 ora.blackaby@warwick.ac.uk

 The research has just been published in the journal 鈥淢aterials Horizons鈥� in a paper entitled

The authors wish to thank Peter W. Dunne, David Burnett, and Luke A. Rochford for help with XRD analysis. We thank EPSRC, Chemistry Innovation, and AkzoNobel for funding (ARM). Some of the equipment used was funded by West Midlands AM2 Science City initiative.

The Royal Society has announced the appointment of 22 new Royal Society Wolfson Research Merit Award holders including Professor Greg Challis of the Department of Chemistry.

Congratulations to the winner of the "Chemistry In Action" Art & Photography Competition, David Withall (PhD student in Challis group), for his entry "Chemically Synthesised Undecylprodigiosin".

David will receive a £50 Amazon Voucher from the Head of Department and Chair of the Welfare & Communications Committee, plus the artwork will soon be displayed prominently in the Department.

Thank you to all those who entered the competition, the final decision was very diffcult for the judging panel as there were so many interesting entries and the standard was very high. Well done David!

Visit for further details.

Congratulations to all our graduands, who are receiving their degrees today.

All staff, colleagues and friends from the Department look forward to this occasion and the opportunity to celebrate your achievements with you and your guests on such a memorable day.

We wish you well and many congratulations on your success!

For theory to make proper contact with experiment, we must average over a large number of geometrical configurations. For big metalloproteins like Type I copper plastocyanin and cucumber basic protein, generating the structures is too expensive for quantum chemistry. In contrast, the empirical ligand field molecular mechanics model invented by the Deeth group at 糖心TV can quickly generate the geometries required. Based on our structures, Nick Besley's group in Nottingham excise the active sites and use them to compute using high level QM methods the absorption and CD spectra. Agreement with experiment is impressive. See the ACS Journal of Physical Chemistry B: