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Scientists may have just traced the source of some of the mysterious infrared emission detected from stars and clouds of interstellar dust and gas. This Unknown Infrared Emission Band (UIE) has baffled scientists for decades; According to a new theoretical work, at least some of these bands could be produced by highly ionized buckminsterfullerene, better known as buckyballs. “I am very honored to have played a part in the extremely complex quantum chemical investigations carried out by Dr Sadjadi that have produced these very exciting results,” said astrophysicist Quentin Parker of the Space Research Laboratory of the University of Hong Kong. “First they looked at the theoretical evidence that Fullerenes – Carbon 60 – can withstand very high ionization rates, and now this work shows the infrared emission signature of the species is a perfect match for some of the most prominent Unknown Infrared Emission features known. This will help re-strengthen this area of ​​research.” Buckminste

Single molecule images obtained by high resolution atomic force microscopy. The selective and reversible structure of the molecule in the middle can be converted to the structure on the right or on the left, with a voltage pulse applied from the tip of the scanning probe microscope. Credit: Leo Gross/IBM A team of researchers from IBM Research Europe, the Universidade de Santiago de Compostela and the University of Regensburg have changed the bonds between atoms in a molecule for the first time. In their paper published in the journal Science , the group explained their method and its possible uses. Igor Alabugin and Chaowei Hu, have published Perspectives in the same issue of the journal outlining the work carried out by the team. Current methods for making complex molecules or molecular devices, as Alagugin and Chaowei note, are generally quite challenging—they liken it to throwing a box of Legos in the washing machine hoping for some usefu

The heart of the Milky Way appears to be a hotspot for molecules that combine to form RNA. A new survey of the thick molecular cloud that shrouds the galactic center has revealed the presence of various nitriles – organic molecules that are often toxic in isolation, but are also molecular building blocks essential for life. The increase in prebiotic molecules (molecules involved in the emergence of life) identified at the center of galaxies, particularly those associated with RNA, has implications for our understanding of how life emerged in the Universe – and how it happened on Earth. “Here we show that the chemistry occurring in the interstellar medium is able to efficiently form some of the nitriles, which are key molecular precursors of the ‘RNA World’ scenario,” explains astrobiologist Víctor Rivilla of the Spanish National Research Council and National Institutes. Aerospace Technology in Spain. Exactly how life arose on Earth is a mystery that basic scientists are eager to achie

Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain Two studies published in the journal Science by researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Plant Breeding Research in Cologne, Germany in collaboration with colleagues in China have discovered natural cellular molecules that drive critical plant immune responses. This compound has all the advantages of being a small messenger designed by plants to activate the main defense control center. Harnessing this insight allows scientists and plant breeders to design molecules that make plants, including many important plant species, more resistant to disease. World food production must double by 2050 to feed the additional 2 billion people living on Earth by that time. Increasing food production requires increasing yields of many of our staple crops. To do so, there needs to be strategies to ensure that we can make crops more resistant to microscopic infectious agents, while also ensuring that food product

A study of the herpes virus infecting chickens offers new insight into the potentially problematic interactions between vaccines made from live viruses and viruses that are meant to be thwarted. Reported in the journal Virulence, the study offers direct evidence that vaccines and viruses can infect the same cells in live animals and share the molecular tools that allow the virus to infect other animals – in this case, chickens. The study focused on Marek’s disease, a viral infection that is spread when a chicken inhales flakes of dead skin or feather tissue from an infected chicken. “We’ve been trying to understand how the virus spreads from one host to another,” said University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign pathobiology professor Keith Jarosinski, who led the study. “Not only did we do it for the benefit of chickens in the poultry industry, but also because of a very similar mechanism used by the virus that causes chickenpox, where it enters through the respiratory tract and infects l