SOUTHWEST RETORT
SEVENTY-FOURTH YEAR
OCTOBER 2021
Published for the advancement of Chemists, Chemical Engineers and Chemistry in this area published by The Dallas-Fort Worth Section, with the cooperation of five other local sections of the American Chemical Society in the Southwest Region.
Vol. 74(2) October 2021 Editorial and Business Offices: Contact the Editor for subscription and advertisement information. Editor: Connie Hendrickson: retort@acsdfw.org Copy and Layout Editor: Lance Hughes: hugla64@gmail.com Business Manager: Martha Gilchrist: Martha.Gilchrist@tccd.edu The Southwest Retort is published monthly, September through May, by the Dallas-Ft. Worth Section of the American Chemical Society, Inc., for the ACS Sections of the Southwest Region.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS Fifty Years Ago………………………….......5 ARTICLES and COLUMNS Letter from the Editor…..…..……..............17 The Chair’s Corner…………………….…...6 NEWS SHORTS Microneedle Patch Delivers COVID-19 DNA Vaccine; doesn’t Require Cold Storage........7 Plastic Shopping Bags Release Thousands of Dissolved Compounds in Sunlight..……….8 Licking a Tootsie Roll® Sensor to Monitor
Health………...……………….....10 Children’s Dislike of Cauliflower, Broccoli could be Written in Their Microbiome….11
Blowing Up Medieval Gunpowder Recipe.12 Surfside Condo Collapse and the Science of Concrete (video)…………………………...13 ACS DFW Local Section Run for Office……………………...………..9 Councilor Report………………….……….14
Contact the DFW Section General: info@acsdfw.org Education: ncw@acsdfw.org Elections: candidates@acsdfw.org Facebook: DFWACS Twitter: acsdfw
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AROUND THE AREA UTD ………………………………...……...15 INDEX OF ADVERTISERS Huffman Laboratories……………..…........3 TCU Positions Available..……...…...….......3 TMJ Data Entry and Editing.………......…3 ANA-LAB…………………………...….…..4 TWU Position Available…………………..13
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FIFTY YEARS AGO IN THE SOUTHWEST RETORT The 1971 ACS Southwest Regional Award has been won by Dr. Bruno J. Zwolinski, founder and head of the Thermodynamics Research Center at Texas A&M University. Dr. Zwolinski is honored for his pace-setting work in kinetics, thermodynamics, and thermochemistry.
damentals” at the University of Oklahoma. Dr. Brinkley S. Snowden attended the “Clay Minerals Conference” in Rapid City, SC. Drs. Peggy M. Dunlap and E. Thomas Strom attended the fall ACS National Meeting in Washington, D.C.
This month’s ACS tour speakers are Dr. Theo Gerritson of the University of Wisconsin Medical Center and Dr. Sidney Siggia of the University of Massachusetts in Amherst. Dr. Gerritson’s talk is on “Inborn Errors of Metabolism as a Cause of Mental Retardation,” while Dr. Siggia’s two topics are “Fads and Fashions in the Teaching and Practice of Analytical Chemistry” and “Organic Functional Group Analysis by Chemical and Instrumental Methods.”
Texas Tech Welch Professor C. W. Shoppee represented the Royal Society at the inauguration on Sept. 24 of Dr. Norman Hackerman as President of Rice University. Dr. James M. Hinton of the University of Arkansas participated in Compiled by the Fourth InternaE. Thomas Strom tional Symposium on Magnetic Resonance at the Weizmann Institute of Science Aug. 24-Sept. 6 in Israel. Among those from Texas A&M University attending the fall ACS National Meeting were Drs. Arthur E. Martell and Barry Shapiro. At Baylor, Welch Professor Malcolm Dole gave a seminar at the Research Triangle Institute in North Carolina on “Free Radical Reactions in Irradiated Polyethylene.”
At TCU, faculty members giving presentations at this fall’s ACS National Meeting were Dr. Clifford Venier and Dr. John Albright. Dr. Manfred Reinecke is on sabbatical this year working with Dr. Ernest Beyer in Tubingen, Germany. At UT-Dallas Dr. Richard A. Caldwell, recently arrived from Cornell University, was named Acting Chairman of the Chemistry Faculty. At North Texas State recent promotions in the Chemistry Department include Dr. S. J. Norton from associate to full professor and Drs. James L. Marshall and Robert Desiderato from assistant to associate professors. Dr. Marshall has started teaching a sophomore laboratory course which does not depend on lecture courses but stands as a course in its own right. Dr. Marshall has developed a textbook for this new course. Dr. G. R. Dobson presented a seminar recently at UT-Arlington. At the Mobil Field Research Laboratory Dr. Earl S. Snavely, Jr. gave a lecture on “Cahodic Protection FunOctober 2021
From the University of Houston Dr. W. W. Wendlandt presented the plenary lecture for the International Confederation of Thermal Analysis meeting held Aug. 23-27 in Davos, Switzerland. Dr. Albert Zlatkis presented lectures on chromatography at the South African Chemical Institute at Johannesburg and at universities in Capetown, Port Elizabeth, Durban, and Pretoria.
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The Chair’s Corner It is finally Fall and we are seeing some, slightly, lower temperatures! I hope you were able to attend the DFW Local Section’s September virtual dinner meeting. Prof. Eric Simanek the Robert A. Welch Professor of Chemistry and the Chair of the Department of Chemistry & Biochemistry at Texas Christian University presented an amazing talk titled, “The Science and History of Whiskey." If you were there, you learned about Whiskey as well as many, many other things. Thank you to Prof. Eric Simanek for that delightful presentation BCongratulations again to our Dr. Mihaela C. Stefan, Eugene McDermott Professor, Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry and Associate Dean for Graduate Education, School of Natural Science & Mathematics, University of Texas at Dallas for being the 2021 Wilfred T. Doherty award winner and Dr. Heather Thompson Science Educator at Mansfield ISD for being the 2021 Werner Schulz Award winner. We are looking into options in November and December to celebrate their awards as well as our 2020 winners. The 2021 ACS Southwest Regional Meeting (SWRM) is right around the corner. The meeting will be held October 31 – November 3 in Austin, TX. Registration is still open for this exciting event (https:// www.acs.org/content/acs/en/meetings/ regional/southwest.html). Congratulations to the student travel award winners from October 2021
the DFW Section: Melissa Orr from the University of Texas at Arlington who will be presenting on “Synthesis and Characterization of Heteroanionic Ln2O2Te (Ln = La, Ce, Pr)” and Alshaima’a Qunies from the University of North Texas Health Sciences Center who will make a presentation on “Discovery of Slack Potassium Channel Inhibitor In vivo Probes: Optimization of the hit compound VU0531245”. Once again, the executive committee continues to be very excited about 2021 and the local section's future. If there is anything that I can do for you, please don’t hesitate to reach out at any time (trey.putnam@ttuhsc.edu) Best, Trey Putnam 2021 Chair DFW Local Section of the ACS
2021 DFW Section Officers Chair: Trey Putnam Chair-elect: Mihaela C. Stefan Past Chair: Mihaela C. Stefan
Treasurer: Martha Gilchrist Secretary: Heidi Conrad Councilors: Mary Anderson, Linda Schultz, E. Thomas Strom, and Jason McAfee Alternate Councilors: Michael Bigwood, John McIlroy, Daniela Hutanu, and Danny Tran
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From the ACS Press Room Microneedle Patch Delivers COVID-19 DNA Vaccine; doesn’t Require Cold Storage “Separable Microneedle Patch to Protect and Deliver DNA Nanovaccines Against COVID-19” ACS Nano
More than 2 billion people worldwide are fully vaccinated against COVID-19. However, many who live in resource-limited countries haven’t been able to get vaccines, partly because these areas lack temperaturecontrolled shipping and storage facilities. Now, researchers reporting in ACS Nano have developed a microneedle patch that delivers a COVID-19 DNA vaccine into the skin, causing strong immune responses in cells and mice. Importantly, the patch can be stored for over 30 days at room temperature. To date, the U.S. Food and Drug AdminThis microneedle patch could someday replace a istration needle for delivering COVID-19 vaccines. Credit: Adapted from ACS Nano 2021, DOI: has au10.1021/acsnano.1c03252 thorized three vaccines for use during the COVID-19 pandemic: one based on protein, and two on October 2021
RNA. All of them must be kept refrigerated or frozen, which limits their distribution to remote or resource-limited areas. In addition, the vaccines must be administered by a healthcare worker as an injection into a muscle. Because immune cells aren’t typically found in muscles, scientists have investigated various ways to deliver vaccines into the skin, which contains abundant antigenpresenting cells (APCs) and could therefore generate a stronger immune response. Hui Li, Guangjun Nie, Hai Wang and colleagues wanted to develop a microneedle patch that efficiently delivers a COVID-19 vaccine under the skin, causing potent and durable immunity without the need for a cold chain or painful injections. The researchers based their vaccine on DNA, which is easier to make than RNA or protein. It’s also more stable than RNA. However, in clinical trials, intramuscular DNA vaccines have been limited in their effectiveness because, unlike RNA or protein, the DNA must find its way inside the cell nucleus to work. By delivering the vaccine into APC-rich skin rather than muscle, the researchers reasoned
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From the ACS Press Room
Plastic Shopping Bags Release Thousands of Dissolved Compounds in Sunlight “Plastic Formulation is an Emerging Control of Its Photochemical Fate in the Ocean” Environmental Science & Technology
Although plastics are durable and strong, a little sunlight can split them apart into microscopic pieces and spur reactions, producing new molecules that can end up in the environment. But how the polymers and additives in these materials influence this process is a mystery. Now, researchers reporting in ACS’ Environmental Science & Technology show that additives in commercial shopping bags boost sunlight’s ability to convert these solid materials into thousands of dissolved compounds within days. Once plastic pollution gets into the environment, its fate is still largely unknown, especially in aquatic ecosystems. Some of the plastic items, such as polyethylene shopping bags, float in water, which
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exposes them directly to the sun’s rays. Previous researchers have shown that the pure polymers commonly used to make these items produce water-soluble molecules and gases when placed in ultraviolet light, a component of sunlight. However, plastics in consumer goods aren’t pure; a variety of carbonbased organic additives and mineral additives are mixed in to give them color or make them more stable. So, Collin Ward and colleagues wanted to see exactly how the composition of single-use shopping bags influenced the dissolved compounds generated by sunlight over short periods. With X-ray diffraction, the researchers examined four polyethylene plastic bags from bigbox retailers and a pure polyethylene polymer film for mineral additives. No additives were identified in the pure polymer, but calcium carbonate and titanium dioxide were found in three of the bags, and only calcium carbonate was found in the fourth bag. Next, the researchers put pieces of the plastic bags and the polymer into separate containers with water, and then in the dark or under simulated daylight for up to a week. Some watersoluble compounds were released from the
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different pieces in the dark. But in sunlight, more compounds were released, ranging from 5,000 to 15,000 dissolved compounds, which equates to 1.1-fold to 50fold increases over the number of compounds released in the dark. Of the approximately 9,000 molecules generated by the pure polymer when exposed to sunlight, only about a quarter overlapped with those from the bags. Based on these results, the researchers say that sunlight’s reactions
with solid plastics can transform them into a plethora of water-soluble compounds whose levels and identities vary, depending on the additives used. The authors acknowledge funding from The Seaver Institute, the Gerstner Family Foundation, the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, and the National Science Foundation’s Graduate Research Fellowship Program, Division of Chemistry and Division of Materials Research.
Thinking about running for office? In the DFW Section, that is!
POSITIONS OPEN:
Chair-Elect (Three-year term: one year as chair-elect, one year as chair, and one year as past chair) Secretary (one year term) Treasurer (one year term) Councilor (three year term): 3 positions up Alternate Councilor (three year term): 3 positions up ELECTION IN NOVEMBER: IF INTERESTED EMAIL HEIDI CONRAD (H.CONRAD@TCU.EDU) AND INCLUDE A SHORT BIOSKETCH. October 2021
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From the ACS Press Room Licking a Tootsie Roll® Sensor to Monitor Health “Soft Candy as an Electronic Material Suit- could be appropriate for managing some conable for Salivary Conductivity-Based Medical Diagnostics in Resource-Scarce Clinical ditions. So, Beelee Chua and Donghyun Lee wanted to repurpose unconventional and Settings” widely available materials, including electriACS Applied Materials & Interfaces cally conductive soft candies, into an easily Single-use diagnostic tests often aren’t pracaccessible, low-waste sensor that could simptical for health professionals or patients in ly be licked by paresource-limited areas, where cost and waste tients to analyze disposal are big concerns. So, researchers retheir saliva. porting in ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces have turned to a surprising material, To make the protoTootsie Roll® candy, to develop an inexpen- type sensor, the resive and low-waste device. The candy was searchers first flatused as an electrode, the part of the sensor tened a Tootsie ® that detects salt and electrolyte levels in sali- Roll and pressed va, to monitor ovulation status or kidney crevices into its surface in a cross- An electrode made with a health. molded Tootsie Roll® and hatched pattern to aluminum tubes can help Disposable test strips have advanced the hold the saliva sam- monitor ovulation status and speed and accuracy of at-home health moniple. Then, they in- kidney health. toring. For example, ovulation predictor kits serted two thin, re- Credit: Adapted from ACS Applied Materials & Intermeasure luteinizing hormone levels, and usable aluminum faces 2021, DOI: 10.1021/ there are test strips that measure creatinine acsami.1c11306 tubes, which acted levels for patients with chronic kidney disas electrical contacts, connecting the candy ease. However, their costs add up quickly electrode into a circuit with a current source and, between the packaging and the strips and an output voltage detector. In preliminary themselves, there’s a lot of waste that needs tests, the device could measure salt levels to be disposed of. Previous researchers have that were physiologically relevant for health indicated that simple measurements of a perContinued on Page 16 son’s salivary salt and electrolyte content October 2021
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From the ACS Press Room
Children’s Dislike of Cauliflower, Broccoli could be Written in Their Microbiome “In-Mouth Volatile Production from Brassica Vegetables (Cauliflower) and Associations with Liking in an Adult/Child Cohort”
produces potent, sulfurous odors when acted upon by an enzyme in the plant’s tissues, as well as by the same enzyme produced by Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemis- bacteria in some people’s oral microbiomes. try Previous studies have shown that adults have Many children, as well as adults, dis- different levels of this enzyme in their saliva, like Brassica vegetables, such as broccoli, but whether children also have different levcauliflower, cabbage and Brussels sprouts. In els, and whether this influences their food the mouth, enzymes from these vegetables preferences, is unknown. Damian Frank and and from bacteria in saliva can produce un- colleagues, who conducted this research at pleasant, sulfurous odors. Now, researchers CSIRO, Australia’s national science agency, reporting in ACS’ Journal of Agricultural wanted to investigate differences in sulfur and Food Chemistry have found that levels volatile production in saliva from children of these volatile compounds are similar in and adults and analyze how they affect Brassica acceptance. The researchers used gas chromatographyolfactometry-mass spectrometry to identify the main odor-active compounds in raw and steamed cauliflower and broccoli. Then, they asked 98 child/parent pairs, with children between 6 and 8 years of age, to rate the key odor compounds. Dimethyl trisulfide, which smells rotten, sulfurous and putrid, was the parent-child pairs, suggesting shared oral mileast liked odor by children and adults. The crobiomes. They also found that high levels team then mixed saliva samples with raw cause children to dislike the vegetables. cauliflower powder and analyzed the volatile Brassica vegetables contain a compound Continued on Page 15 called S-methyl-ʟ-cysteine sulfoxide that October 2021
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From the ACS Press Room
Blowing Up Medieval Gunpowder Recipes “Evolution of Medieval Gunpowder: Ther- der recipes to help understand the intent of modynamic and Combustion Analysis” master gunners in creating these formulas, as ACS Omega well as to provide important technical inforFirst used for battle in China in about 900 mation about early gunpowder manufacturA.D., gunpowder spread throughout Eurasia ing.
by the end of the 13th century, eventually revolutionizing warfare as a propellant in firearms and artillery. Meanwhile, master gunners tinkered with gunpowder formulas, trying to find the ideal concoction. Now, researchers reporting in ACS Omega have recreated medieval gunpowder recipes and Researchers tested medieval gunpowder recipes in this replianalyzed the energies released during com- ca of an early 15th-century stone-throwing cannon. Credit: Adapted from ACS Omega 2021, DOI: 10.1021/ bustion, revealing that the evolution of the acsomega.1c03380 perfect powder was a slow, trial-and-error process. To do this, the researchers identified over 20 Although largely obsolete in modern wea- gunpowder recipes from medieval texts dated ponry, gunpowder, also known as black 1336 to 1449 A.D. They prepared the powders powder, is still used in historical weapons, and measured the energies released just before fireworks and pyrotechnics. The explosive and during combustion using differential is a combination of varying ratios of potas- scanning calorimetry and bomb calorimetry. sium nitrate (or “saltpeter”), sulfur and They also tested a few of the recipes at a West charcoal. Medieval recipes sometimes in- Point firing range using a replica of an early cluded interesting additives, such as cam- 15th-century stone-throwing cannon. phor, varnish or brandy, with obscure purposes. Dawn Riegner, Cliff Rogers and their team of chemists and historians wanted to analyze the energetics of medieval gunpowOctober 2021
In general, in the period 1338–1400 A.D., the percentage of saltpeter increased and charcoal decreased, causing lower heats of combustion, which could have produced safer recipes for
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From the ACS Press Room medieval gunners. After 1400 A.D., the percentage of saltpeter (the most expensive ingredient) decreased slightly, while sulfur and charcoal increased, raising the heat of combustion, although not as high as for the earliest recipes. Certain additives, such as the combination of camphor and ammonium chloride, appeared to make gunpowder stronger, whereas others, such as water or brandy, did not show energetic advantages, but might have served other purposes. For example, they might have made the material more stable during transport or storage. Although the researchers have characterized the gunpowders in the lab and in limited experiments on the firing range, more field work must be done to evaluate which formulation would perform the best in historical contexts, they say. The authors acknowledge funding from the Stevens Institute of Technology’s Pinnacle Scholars Program and The Omar N. Bradley Historical Research Fellowship | United States Military Academy West Point.
Surfside Condo Collapse and the Science of Concrete (video) WASHINGTON, Sept. 20, 2021 — Concrete buildings don’t just collapse out of the blue. Even earthquakes aren’t supposed to bring them down. So why did the Champlain Towers South building in Surfside, Florida — a modern structure built in 1981 — fail? https://youtu.be/4Nr3w1BQE18
OPEN POSITION Faculty - Assistant Professor Chemistry and Biochemistry For job description and details on how to apply, go to:
https://www.higheredjobs.com/ faculty/details.cfm? JobCode=177630078
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Councilor Report: American Chemical Society Fall 2021 National Meeting The ACS held its Fall National Meeting August 22-26 in Atlanta, GA, in a hybrid format. As of August 25, there were 8,205 registrations (1,895 hybrid and 6,310 virtual). Of approximately 1,200 oral sessions held, 71 were in-person-only, 244 were hybrid, and 855 were virtual. I registered early in anticipation of the meeting having face-to-face components, before I realized that the meeting dates coincided with the first week of classes at my institution. Therefore, I was unable to attend in person. I did speak with colleagues who presented – in both oral and poster format – and they reported that all went well. However, an issue that many reported was that since they were still physically at their work place, they were expected to be doing their normal activities unless they were actively participating in a session. Therefore, they missed all additional sessions that they might have attended, as well as the networking opportunities that make these meetings so refreshing and inspiring. I attended Councilor Meetings and the ACS Council Meeting, and these were very informative. Some of the information that I picked up is as follows: Spring and Fall 2022 National Meeting Registration fees will be $399 in-person, hybrid and $199 virtual. ACS is in good financial health. 2021 (through June) showed a Net Surplus from Operations of $55M, which is $6M greater than the same period in 2021. Over 90% of the revenue is due to Information Services.
For the past 5 years, there has been a steady decrease in industry members. A special discussion was held on this issue to address ways to decrease cost and increase value for this group. One factor which may help is the 2022 membership schedule. The new schedule will officially launch to the public January 1, 2022. The new membership options will be presented to renewing members for the upcoming 2022 term beginning in fall 2021. Three options will be available: Premium Package (Member, Affiliates), $160/yr.; Standard Package (Members Only), $80/yr., and the Basic Package (Associates), $0/yr. Finally, the ACS Officer Election period is September 27th through October 22nd at noon. You should have already received your ballot. So now, go vote! Respectfully, Linda Schultz
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Around the Area UT Dallas Associate Professor Steven O. Nielsen and his collaborators in the Department of Mechanical Engineering, the Icahn School of Medicine, and Massachusetts General Hospital were awarded a four-year, $3,000,000 Collaborative Research grant from the NSF titled: Understanding the neuropeptide modulation of brain circuits by advanced nanomaterials and imaging. Professor Julia Chan was awarded a threeyear, $450,000 grant from the DOE titled: In situ probing and investigation of the crystal growth of highly correlated intermetallics. Robert A. Welch Distinguished Chair and Professor Vladimir Gevorgyan was awarded a three-year $1,279,200 NIH grant titled: Transition metal-radical hybrid methods for organic synthesis. Professor Faruck Morcos is leading a team in creating a project aimed at getting people excited about exploring the molecular world. Along with students from DFW high schools, they created an NSF-funded game app where players are scientists who go out into the real world to discover molecules to take back to the app’s laboratory (www.moleculego.com). The Big Idea Competition (BIC), hosted annually by the UT Dallas Institute for Innovation and Entrepreneurship and presented in partnership with UT Southwestern Medical Center will take place on November 2nd and 3rd. The BIC brings the best undergraduate and graduate students together from all disciOctober 2021
plines, alongside top research faculty and alumni, to pitch the most innovative startups and ideas for scholarship awards. Photos and the full story about Professor Gevorgyan’s award can be found at:
https://nsm.utdallas.edu/chemistry-professor -awarded-1-2-million-to-probe-organicsynthesis-methods/ .
“Children’s Dislikes” Continued from page 11 compounds produced over time. Large differences in sulfur volatile production were found between individuals, and children usually had similar levels as their parents, which is likely explained by similar microbiomes. Children whose saliva produced high amounts of sulfur volatiles disliked raw Brassica vegetables the most, but this relationship was not seen in adults, who might learn to tolerate the flavor over time. These results provide a new potential explanation for why some people like Brassica vegetables and others (especially children) don’t, the researchers say. The authors from CSIRO.
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funding
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From the ACS Press Room Continued
“Tootsie Roll”
“Microneedle Patch”
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monitoring in a salt-water solution and artificial saliva. For example, when covered in diluted artificial saliva, the sensor could reliably measure a change in voltage low enough to detect the 10-30% drop in salts that occurs when a person ovulates. While the maximum salt content in the artificial saliva samples was similar to that of a healthy adult, the researchers used calculations to estimate that conductivities three times higher, which signal a problem with the kidneys, would be within the measurable range of the device. Although testing with real human samples is still needed, the researchers say that using soft candy as electrodes opens up the possibility for lowwaste, inexpensive electrochemical sensors and circuits in the future.
The authors acknowledge funding from the National Research Foundation of Korea.
that they could increase the chances that the DNA would enter the nucleus of an APC. To make their delivery system, the team attached DNA sequences encoding either the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein or nucleocapsid protein to the surface of non-toxic nanoparticles. Inside the nanoparticles was an adjuvant — a molecule that helps stimulate an immune response. Then, the researchers coated a microneedle patch with the vaccine nanoparticles. The small rectangular patch contained 100 biodegradable microneedles, each less than 1/10 the diameter of a bee’s stinger, that could painlessly penetrate the skin’s outer layer. The researchers tested the system in mice, showing that the spike-protein-encoding microneedle patch caused strong antibody and T-cell responses, with no observable side effects. Because the vaccine patches can be stored at room temperature for at least 30 days without losing efficacy, they could be an important tool for developing COVID-19 vaccines with global accessibility, the researchers say.
The authors acknowledge funding from the National Natural Science Foundation of China and the Key Laboratory for Biomedical Effects of Nanomaterials and Nanosafety, Chinese Academy of Sciences. October 2021
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From the Editor
It is always astonishing how garbled, not to mention erroneous, information about chemistry can be. On a recent episode of a program about firefighters, the fire guys were battling a series of fires at laundromats. Turns out the fires started in the dryers...residue from a powdered detergent was left on the clothes and ignited in the dryer. In one scene, some powdered detergent was dumped on the ground and vapor from it ignited. Very mysterious...until the manufacturer realized that the blender had substituted methanol for sodium lauryl sulfate… !! What else can I say?
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