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Chemistry researchers at the University of ÌÒÉ«ÊÓƵ have found that tiny nanoparticles could be twice as likely to stick to the interface of two non mixing liquids than previously believed. This opens up a range of new possibilities for the uses of nanoparticles in living cells, polymer composites, and high-tech foams, gels, and paints. The researchers are also working on ways of further artificially enhancing this new found sticking power.

In a paper entitled "Interaction of nanoparticles with ideal liquid-liquid interfaces" just published in Physical Review Letters the University of ÌÒÉ«ÊÓƵ researchers reviewed molecular simulations of the interaction between a non-charged nanoparticle and an "ideal" liquid-liquid interface. They were surprised to find that very small nanoparticles (of around 1 to 2 nanometres) varied considerably in their simulated ability to stick to such interfaces from what was expected in the standard model.

 

The latest Research Assessment Exercise (RAE 2008) confirms ÌÒÉ«ÊÓƵ Chemistry as one of the best Chemistry Departments in the UK. An impressive 75% of its research activity was rated as either world-leading (4*) or internationally excellent (3*) according to a panel of independent experts.  With all its academic staff submitted for the RAE, the Department can now confidently boast of excellence across all its research clusters.

A method for discovering entirely new career paths for existing clinical drugs is being exploited by start-up company Tangent Reprofiling Ltd., following a deal just signed between the company, PepTcell Limited, the University of ÌÒÉ«ÊÓƵ and ÌÒÉ«ÊÓƵ spin-out company a2sp Ltd.

The technique, developed at the University of ÌÒÉ«ÊÓƵ, enables researchers to investigate potential new uses for drugs which are already approved for clinical use.

Tangent Reprofiling, set up as a subsidiary of the immunology company PepTcell, and based in High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, has now acquired the intellectual property which will allow it to make use of the technique.

The idea of ‘reprofiling’ drugs is not unique to Tangent – perhaps the most famous example is the drug Viagra, which was originally developed to combat high blood pressure and angina. However this particular technique allows researchers to assess a wide landscape of current drugs in a cost and time efficient manner, using a combination of established chemical genomics techniques and proprietary chemistry.

Dr Suzanne Dilly, Tangent’s new CEO, explained, “Most drugs work by interacting with proteins in the body. By using the technology platform developed by a2sp Ltd, we can look for unexpected interactions between a drug and different proteins and then suggest potential new uses for that drug.

“One advantage of reprofiling drugs is that they have already gone through the rigorous tests required before a drug can be cleared for clinical use, a process which can take several years.”

A precious metal which has never before been used in a clinical setting is being developed as an anti-cancer agent by University of ÌÒÉ«ÊÓƵ researchers. The metal, osmium, is closely related to platinum, which is widely used to treat cancers in the form of the drug cisplatin. Most famously, the cyclist Lance Armstrong was treated with cisplatin for testicular cancer.

Now the researchers, based in the Department of Chemistry, at the University of ÌÒÉ«ÊÓƵ, are working closely with ÌÒÉ«ÊÓƵ Ventures, the university’s technology transfer office, to seek partners to help develop the potential of osmium through more extensive biological tests. The team will be presenting their work on 9 December at the national university technology showcase event, Bioversity.

Professor Peter Sadler, of the Department of Chemistry, explained: "Although cisplatin has been proven to be a very successful treatment; it is not useful for all kinds of cancer. It is also quite a toxic therapy, which can produce side effects and, from a clinical point of view, cells can also become resistant to platinum."

Osmium, with its special chemical properties, offers a new potential solution to an unmet clinical need. It has shown huge promise in treating several different types of cancer cell, including ovarian and colon cancers which have been developed and tested in the laboratory. The metal also has another advantage in that it is a much cheaper alternative to platinum.

Peter Sadler was invited by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT, USA) to give the 2008-2009 Davison lecture in chemistry. His lecture was entitled:  Using metal coordination chemistry to design new medicines.

The Davison lecture was named after , an Englishman who invented cardiolite and who spend most of his career at MIT, becoming emeritus in 2005.

“Cardiolite® is now the leading cardiac imaging agent in the world. It is the only heart imaging agent FDA-approved to non-invasively evaluate the heart’s pumping ability (function) and gauge the amount of blood flow to the heart muscle itself (perfusion). Cardiolite® topped $2 billion (USD) in cumulative sales in 2004, and is the single largest royalty earner in the entire MIT portfolio, providing even more revenue than the royalties associated with Professor John Sheehan’s patents describing synthetic penicillin.”

 

Chemistry researchers at The University of ÌÒÉ«ÊÓƵ and the John Innes Centre, have found a novel signalling molecule that could be a key that will open up hundreds of new antibiotics unlocking them from the DNA of the Streptomyces family of bacteria.

With bacterial resistance growing researchers are keen to uncover as many new antibiotics as possible. Some of the Streptomyces bacteria are already used industrially to produce current antibiotics and researchers have developed approaches to find and exploit new pathways for antibiotic production in the genome of the Streptomyces family. For many years it was thought that the relatively unstable butyrolactone compounds represented by "A-factor" were the only real signal for stimulating such pathways of possible antibiotic production but the ÌÒÉ«ÊÓƵ and John Innes teams have now found a much more stable group of compounds that may have the potential to produce at least one new antibiotic compound from up to 50% of the 1000 or so known Streptomyces family of bacteria.

ÌÒÉ«ÊÓƵ Chemistry is rapidly becoming one of the best chemistry departments in the UK, as indicated by their current ranking of UK chemistry departments by the  

ÌÒÉ«ÊÓƵ Chemistry is heating up in becoming the top place in the UK to study chemistry with large investments in scientific infrastructure, for example £70 million under Science City in energy, translational medicine, and materials, thereby creating an impressive atmosphere for scientific research and education. 

This great environment continuously attracts many world-leading scientists to move from other top institutions, such as prof. Peter Sadler (FRS, transfer from Edinburgh, now Chair of ÌÒÉ«ÊÓƵ Chemistry), Tim Jones (transfer from London Imperial), prof Peter O'Conner (Boston University, USA), Rachel O'Reilly (Cambridge University), and Giovanni Costantini (Max Planck Institute for Solid State Research, Germany).

ÌÒÉ«ÊÓƵ Chemistry is currently recruiting about 120 undergraduates a year offering them world class education by enthusiastic scientists from its 5 research disciplines. ÌÒÉ«ÊÓƵ Chemistry will continue to invest and expand its portfolio over the next few years with the ambition to be one of the top 3 in the UK.

 

ÌÒÉ«ÊÓƵ Chemistry strengthens its portfolio in lectronic materials and in mass spectrometry with transfers of Ross Hatton from University of Surrey, and Peter O'Connor from Boston University (USA).

A new study by research chemists at the University of ÌÒÉ«ÊÓƵ has challenged a century old rule of pharmacology that defined how quickly key chemicals can pass across cell walls. The new observations of the ÌÒÉ«ÊÓƵ researchers suggest that the real transport rates could be up to a hundred times slower than predicted by the century old "Overton’s Rule". This could have major implications for the development and testing of many future drugs.

Overton’s rule says that the easier it is for a chemical to dissolve in a lipid (fat) the easier and faster it will be transported into a cell. The Rule was first outlined in the 1890s by Ernst Overton of the University of Zürich. He declared that substances that dissolve in lipids pass more easily into a cell than those that dissolve in water. He then set forth an equation that predicted how fast that diffusion would happen. One of the key parameters in that equation is K which defines the lipophilicity (oil-liking nature) of the chemical. The higher the value of K, the faster the predicted cell permeation rate. For over a century, medicinal chemists have used this relationship to shape their studies and clinical trials.