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Category Archives: Chemistry

A nonantibiotic approach for treating urinary tract infections

Public release date: 15-Aug-2012 [ | E-mail | Share ]

Contact: Michael Bernstein m_bernstein@acs.org 202-872-6042 American Chemical Society

WASHINGTON, Aug. 15, 2012 The latest episode in the American Chemical Society's (ACS') award-winning Global Challenges/Chemistry Solutions podcast series describes a potential new approach for treating urinary tract infections (UTIs) which affect millions of people annually without traditional antibiotics. Because it involves non-antibiotic compounds, the approach would not contribute to the growing problem of antibiotic-resistant bacteria, or "superbugs."

Based on a report by Beat Ernst, Ph.D., and colleagues in ACS' Journal of Medicinal Chemistry, the new podcast is available without charge at iTunes and from http://www.acs.org/globalchallenges.

In the podcast, Ernst explains that antibiotics are the mainstay treatment for UTIs. Bacteria, however, are developing resistance to common antibiotics, with the emergence of superbugs that shrug off some of the most powerful new antibiotics.

Thus, the scientists decided to try a new approach developing substances that target bacteria virulence factors, inhibiting them from sticking to the inside of the urinary bladder. Hence, microbes are not able to launch an infection. In addition, this new class of antimicrobials is expected to have a reduced potential for the emergence of resistant microbes.

The scientists describe the development of anti-adhesion molecules that specifically interfere with the attachment of bacteria to human bladder cells. The most potent of the substances prevented a UTI from developing in mice (stand-ins for humans in this kind of experiment) for more than eight hours. In the in vivo treatment study, a very low dose reduced the amount of bacteria in the bladder of the animals by almost 10,000 times, which is comparable to the standard antibiotic treatment with ciprofloxacin.

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Global Challenges/Chemistry Solutions is a series of podcasts describing some of the 21st century's most daunting problems, and how cutting-edge research in chemistry matters in the quest for solutions. Global Challenges is the centerpiece in an alliance on sustainability between ACS and the Royal Society of Chemistry. Global Challenges is a sweeping panorama of global challenges that includes dilemmas such as providing a hungry and thirsty world with ample supplies of safe food and clean water, developing alternatives to petroleum to fuel society, preserving the environment and ensuring a sustainable future for our children and improving human health.

For more entertaining, informative science videos and podcasts from the ACS Office of Public Affairs, view Prized Science, Spellbound, Science Elements and Global Challenges/Chemistry Solutions.

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A nonantibiotic approach for treating urinary tract infections

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ChemAxon Announces New Version of chemicalize.org for Tablet PCs

BUDAPEST, Hungary, August 14, 2012 /PRNewswire/ --

ChemAxon, a leader in providing chemistry software for the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries, announces that its free, open access, web-based chemistry search and extraction service, chemicalize.org, is now supported on touchscreen tablet PCs including Apple iPad and Android devices. This new version provides users with high resolution chemically-intelligent web search and extraction on the move.

Powered by ChemAxon technology and used by scientists worldwide, chemicalize.org identifies chemical names (SMILES, InChI, traditional and IUPAC names) on websites, in text and PDF files, converting them to 2D structures. Researchers can also calculate and explore a range of structure-based properties, search by structure in the ever expanding chemicalize.org knowledge-base, and search the internet to find all websites citing a particular chemical structure.

The new chemicalize.org features:

To try for yourself visit http://www.chemicalize.org

To discover more about how ChemAxon's leading edge cross platform solutions power modern cheminformatics and chemical communication, please visit http://www.chemaxon.com

About ChemAxon

ChemAxon is a leader in providing cheminformatics software development platforms and desktop applications for the biotechnology, pharmaceutical and agrochemical industries. With core capabilities for structure visualization, search and management, property prediction, virtual synthesis, screening and drug design, ChemAxon focuses upon active interaction with users and software portability to create powerful, cost effective cross platform solutions and programming interfaces to power modern cheminformatics and chemical communication. The company is privately owned with European headquarters in Budapest and sales and support offices in Europe, Japan and North America.

The ChemAxon logo is a trademark of ChemAxon Ltd. All rights reserved. All other trademarks mentioned in this document are the property of their respective owners.

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ChemAxon Announces New Version of chemicalize.org for Tablet PCs

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Aeterna Zentaris to Present Preclinical Data for PI3K/Erk 1/2 Inhibitor, AEZS-136, at ACS National Meeting

QUBEC CITY, Aug. 13, 2012 /PRNewswire/ - Aeterna Zentaris Inc. (AEZS) (TSX:AEZ) (the"Company") today announced that its V.P., Medicinal Chemistry, Matthias Gerlach, PhD, will be making a poster presentation on preclinical results for the Company's novel orally active anticancer PI3K/Erk 1/2 inhibitor, AEZS-136, during the 244th National Meeting of the American Chemistry Society which will be held August 19-23, 2012, in Philadelphia.

About AEZS-136

AEZS-136 is an integral part of the Company's kinase research program comprising the investigation of different compounds for single Erk inhibition, single PI3K inhibition and dualErk/PI3K kinase inhibition. AEZS-136 selectively inhibits the kinase activity of Erk 1/2 and class 1 PI3Ks, enabling simultaneous inhibition of the Raf-Mek-Erk and the PI3K-Akt signaling cascades. AEZS-136 was discovered using the Company's proprietary compound library and high throughput screening technology.

About Aeterna Zentaris

Aeterna Zentaris is an oncology and endocrinology drug development company currently investigating treatments for various unmet medical needs. The Company's pipeline encompasses compounds at all stages of development, from drug discovery through to marketed products. For more information please visit http://www.aezsinc.com.

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Aeterna Zentaris to Present Preclinical Data for PI3K/Erk 1/2 Inhibitor, AEZS-136, at ACS National Meeting

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The bio games

Gamers could put their skills to use to diagnose diseases in the future. A set of digital games, for example BioGames, would allow users to make decisions or label microscopic images of specimens on their PCs, tablets and mobile phones. This solution to sorting through large quantities of medical data was thought up by Aydogan Ozcan and colleagues at the University of California, Los Angeles, US.

 

With more and more cheap and portable digital imaging and sensing devices being developed, huge amounts of biomedical data from all over the world are going to be generated. The data will provide an opportunity to understand disease patterns in different parts of the world, for example. But there aren’t enough medical experts to sort through all this data.

That is why Ozcan is turning to gamers for help. In their latest experiment, Ozcan’s team asked 1000 people from over 60 countries to look at grids containing microscope images of red blood cell samples to pick out the cells infected with malaria. They used a stain that makes the cells infected with malaria appear blue. The gamers’ job was to kill or bank infected and healthy cells, respectively. Ozcan’s team measured the diagnostic accuracy of the responses and found that the accuracy level was comparable to those of expert medical professionals. To ensure that accuracy was maintained, the gamers were assessed individually based on their responses.

The BioGames programme

The BioGames interface was made available on the internet in May 2012 and Ozcan reports that more than 2150 gamers from 77 countries have registered on their servers. They have already generated more than 1.5 million individual cell diagnoses.

Of course the idea isn’t new. In 2011, Chemistry World featured a piece about using people’s computers for drug discovery and simulating the way proteins fold. Gamers weren’t needed this time though as the work was happening in the background while the computers were in idle mode.

Other crowd-sourcing websites include Fold it, which enables the user to contribute to research into diseases by folding proteins and Galaxy Zoo, where the user can help astronomers explore the universe.

You don’t always have to wear a lab coat to contribute to science.

Elinor Hughes

 

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CW competition blog – Felicity Mellor

This is a guest post from one of our judges for the Chemistry World Science Communication Competition

 

What you say in a piece of science communication matters. Get the facts wrong, and the communication fails. Focus on an obscure technicality and omit to say why it is relevant, and the reader will stop. The communication fails again. But what to say is just one small part of the communicator’s task. How to say it is just as important. A good science communicator needs to think about form as well as content.

Among other things, that means thinking about the precise words you use, not just in terms of their clarity but also for the overtones they carry. For instance, using militaristic metaphors – fighting, killing, waging war and so on – to talk about a natural process might help explain certain features of the process but it might also make it harder to introduce those aspects of the system that interact in a cooperative manner. Or calling the Higgs boson the ‘God particle’ might be seen as threatening religion when that is not your intention. And it’s not just the words you use that need careful thought. Even trivial things like inserting a paragraph break or replacing a semi-colon with a full stop can make a difference to how well your piece flows.

Paying close attention to form also means thinking about how to craft a story out of the topic you have chosen. Who are the main characters? How will you describe them? What are the key events that drive the story forward? The main characters will not necessarily be the most prominent scientists involved – they may not be scientists at all – and the key events of the story are likely to be different from the key points in an explanation of the science.

In audio and video, there are additional aspects of form to consider. For instance, where do you film someone – in an office, a lab, an outside space, their home? This decision will influence what the viewer thinks about this person. Even in audio pieces, it makes a difference whether you record in a studio (which can emphasise the authority of the speaker but sounds flat and sterile) or on location (which risks a confusion of sounds but adds colour and texture to the piece).

Thinking about form also means thinking about what is not said. Artists often talk about the importance of white space – shapes are made by what surrounds them as well as by what they contain. The same is true for all types of communication. By leaving some things out, what is left in takes on a different meaning than if it were contextualised by additional information.

Similarly, leaving in a silence in an audio piece can generate a moment of emotional intensity or give an edginess to the piece. In video, holding a shot for a few moments before cutting away can signal a contemplative mood. But for upbeat fast-moving topics, such effects may be out of place.

So form needs to match content. Pay attention to form, but the ultimate aim is to make the form of your communication seem so natural that it disappears from view. As Philip Ball says in his blog, don’t strain for effect. Don’t try so hard that it shows that you are trying. A good communicator thinks about form to ensure that the audience doesn’t.

 

Felicity Mellor is a senior lecturer in science communication at Imperial College London

 

You can also read Lesley Yellowlees‘, Adam Hart-Davis’ and Philip Ball’s tips on science writing.

And you can find out about the Chemistry World Science Communication Competition and submit your entry here.

 

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Chemistry in its element – saccharin

sweetener dispenserSo sweet, it’s in the dictionary. A classic accidental discovery, the whiff of betrayal between its co-discoverers makes the story behind saccharin less than sickly sweet in this week’s Chemistry in its element podcast.

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