Month: August 2021

Thiophenol stacking motions

An investigation on the thiophenol dimer and trimer was published in the Journal of Physical Chemistry Letters. The weakly-bound dimer adopts a stacked structure, while simultaneously maintaining a weak S-H···S hydrogen bond. Two isomers were detected for the dimer in the gas-phase. Notoriously, a large-amplitude motion was observed in one of the dimers, exchanging the proton donor and aceptor thiol groups.

 


Cracking DNA for students

Alberto Lesarri gave a talk at the “Diego de Praves” Secondary School in Valladolid last February 2, replicating the 1950’s DNA X-ray diffraction experiment with a laser pointer and a light bulb. This demonstration experiment basically shows the diffraction of an helix, giving opportunity to talk of the experimental work of Rosalind Franklin, as explained in 2018 in the American Journal of Physics.

You can compare the pointer diffraction, with the real pattern below:


Matrine isomerism

An investigation on matrine , a tetracyclic bis-quinolizidine alkaloid from the Sephora plants, was published in January 2021 in Journal  of Organic Chemistry. The molecule showed two (trans and cis) isomers in the gas-phase, confirming conformational rearrangements in matrine alkaloids. Matrine alkaloids have four stereogenic carbon centers, producing a large family of 16 stereoisomers in 8 enantiomeric pairs.