X-ray Spectrometry / Ezine
Herpes invasion
Date: Jul 15, 2010
Author: David Bradley
Herpes viruses cause several incurable diseases. They infect cells by fusing viral and cellular membranes. Now, X-ray studies have revealed the unusual structure of a key protein complex that allows a herpes virus to invade cells.
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Structure of full-length class I chitinase from rice revealed by X-ray crystallography and small-angle X-ray scattering
Date: Jul 12, 2010
Author:
As an initial step toward elucidating the mechanism of hydrolytic action and antifungal activity, the full-length structure of the rice class I chitinase OsChia1b was analyzed by X-ray crystallography and small-angle X-ray scattering.
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Life on earth is plausible
Date: Jul 1, 2010
Author: David Bradley
A 2009 explanation for how the building blocks of life could have been activated now has new crystallographic evidence to support the emergence of the RNA world 4 billion years ago.
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X-rays on the other hand
Date: Jun 15, 2010
Author: David Bradley
US scientists have made a catalyst that triggers the creation of chemical structures exhibiting a difficult-to-make form of chirality, or handedness, known as atropisomerism, they report in the journal Science. Single-crystal, heavy-atom X-ray analysis of the major product allowed the team to assign an absolute configuration and so demonstrate efficacy.
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Analysing metals in bottle-grade poly(ethylene terephthalate) by X-ray fluorescence spectrometry
Date: Jun 14, 2010
Author:
X-ray fluorescence revealed that iron is an intrinsic contaminant in the recycling process of bottle-grade PET samples, furnishing a way to indicate class separation of bottle-grade PET from virgin bottle-grade PET.
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X-rays help improve therapeutic antibodies
Date: Jun 1, 2010
Author: David Bradley
X-ray crystallography has been used to determine the structure of a new, improved protein that could be employed in the purification of therapeutic antibodies and to reveal details of its complexes with antibodies. The work represents an improved molecular design based on greater stability and higher affinity of the protein for its antibody target and could cut costs in therapeutic antibody manufacture.
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What's wood worth?
Date: May 15, 2010
Author: David Bradley
X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and other techniques have been used to confirm the properties of catalysts used to make biofuels derived from a potentially sustainable woody source, lignocellulose.
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Investigation of historical documents for forensic purposes by x-ray fluorescence spectrometry
Date: May 10, 2010
Author:
The suitability of energy dispersive x-ray fluorescence (EDXRF) in the field of forensic document examination was illustrated by the analysis of historic documents.
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X-ray fuel
Date: May 1, 2010
Author: David Bradley
X-ray absorption spectroscopy, XAS, has been used to probe the metal centre of an important enzyme that can oxidise methane, natural gas, to methanol. Turns out the metal is copper not iron as previously thought and the discovery could open up a route to novel catalysts for converting "waste" methane (either from landfill or oil well flare-off) into useful liquid methanol for proceesing into fuel or other more valuable products.
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Short, sharp outburst
Date: Apr 15, 2010
Author: David Bradley
A new approach to generating ultra-short, high-density electron pulses for the production of advanced X-ray sources has been developed.
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