Volume 8 Issue 1, January 2024

Cable bacteria are able to conduct electrons to interconvert oxygen and water. Here, researchers have isolated the conducting cable bacteria skeletons to demonstrate their activity in an electrochemical cell.

A route to synthetically interesting axially chiral diaryl ethers combines an asymmetric desymmetrization and a kinetic resolution.

If intense ionizing radiation was present at a time of prebiotic life, protocells would have needed protection. Researchers have shown that peptide-containing coacervates can harbour DNA strands, which can then be coated with Mn-containing coacervates protecting the interior from radiation.

A decade ago, Zaworotko and co-workers engaged the principles of crystal engineering to demonstrate that narrow-pore (<0.7 nm) coordination networks are ideal sorbent platforms for small-molecule sorbates. This approach transformed sorbent design for such separations and has provided several performance benchmarks in trace gas capture-enabled purifications.

Stochastic processes, including chemical reactions, can be driven away from thermodynamic equilibrium through ratchet mechanisms. This Review explores how biology uses ratchets to achieve remarkable synthetic control and discusses the recognition of, and early progress in, ratchet-like synthesis in artificial systems.

This Review provides guidelines for electrolyte and interphase design and discusses LiF-rich interphases with high interfacial energies, high mechanical strength and high ionic:electronic conductivity ratios, which enable the construction of a wide range of highly stable, safe and energy-dense battery systems with fast-charging capabilities.

Molecular chameleons adapt their conformations to the properties of the environment so that polar functionalities are dynamically shielded or exposed. This allows chameleons to display both high cell permeability and aqueous solubility, and to bind to their drug targets.

The total biosynthesis and engineering of complex natural products is now routinely achieved in filamentous fungal host organisms. This technology offers substantial advantages over traditional total chemical synthesis for the production of both known and new specialized metabolites.