Chemistry Medicinal chemistry

The lipids in some herbal teas have been identified in detail for the first time, preparing the ground for investigating their contribution to the health benefits of the teas.

An international team led by Professor Yan Xu from Osaka Metropolitan University has developed a groundbreaking nanofluidic device, named NANa, capable of stochastically capturing and digitally detecting individual proteins at cellular concentrations. This tool, vital for precision medicine, is designed to handle tiny volumes equivalent to a single cell's contents and can identify single biomolecules even in high-concentration environments. The team plans to conduct further demonstrations using actual cell samples and explore the integration of this tool with AI and biological big data. This research could potentially revolutionize personalized disease prevention and treatment.

Garden soil houses a variety of bacteria and their natural byproducts — including one that may help halt tumor growth. Lankacidins are molecules that can be isolated from Strepomyces rochei, a common bacterium in soil. In addition to antimicrobial properties, a type of lankacidins, called lankacidin C, can inhibit tumor activity in various cancer cell lines, including leukemia, melanoma, ovarian and breast cancers. Lankacidin C offers a potential foundation on which to design anticancer drugs, but its structure is complicated and difficult to manipulate, according to an international research group. The same group recently identified where antitumor activity is housed on the molecule and has now used that information to simplify lankacidin as a potential starting point to engineer treatments.

Researchers reveal correlation between ribotype (RT) strains of Cutibacterium acnes, which are found in human skin, and the lifespan of the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans. Strains RT4 and 8, which are associated with acne in human skin, shortened the lifespan of the nematode, while RT6, which are predominantly found in healthy human skin, did not. Also, it was found that the healthy skin-related RT6 strain of C. acnes improved C. elegans resistance to the pathogenic organism Staphylococcus aureus.

Researchers have found a way to enhance radiation therapy using novel iodine nanoparticles.

The generation of alkyl radicals was achieved by direct visible-light excitation of the organoborate complex, which was designed and synthesized from “boracene,” which has a boron atom in the tetracene-like skeleton. The alkyl radicals thus obtained could be used as a carbon source for chemical reactions, enabling the synthesis of complicated/bulky organic compounds. The present study offers a new protocol for organic synthesis, which is expected to accelerate e.g. drug discovery.