We Made One Gram Of Remdesivir • Hacker News Board

Re: We Made One Gram Of Remdesivir

#41

Post by hetspookjee » Sun, Apr 05, 2020, 5:22 AM UTC

Gigablah wrote: post #30

eyegor wrote: post #20

This article really reinforces my choice to drop ochem in college. It's funny how deciphering assembly code seems downright mundane compared to this jargon. Like, I get how given the process you could recreate things, or you could devise possible reactions based on electron shells and bonding tendencies, but how do researchers even figure out how to make these reactions happen? Especially when they require -100C, or…

Speaking of elaborate processes, NileRed’s recent video about the laborious process of making aerogel is a fascinating watch: https://youtu.be/Y0HfmYBlF8g

His channel is a recommender in general. I always refer to his lactose free video when people ask me how it's made and what it is. Excellent channel!

Re: We Made One Gram Of Remdesivir

#42

Post by GavinMcG » Sun, Apr 05, 2020, 5:28 AM UTC

nbabitskiy wrote: post #32

kccqzy wrote: post #22

Remdesivir is an analog of adenosine, one of the four building blocks of RNA. Just look at the main structure and you'll agree they look similar. It turns out the mechanism of action of this drug is that it's supposed to be confused with adenosine, so that the viral RNA replication process uses remdesivir instead of adenosine, which later breaks the RNA†. Our body, or really, all biological processes can synthesize i…

>> look at the main structure and you'll agree I don't know much about RNA, but this sentence is pure bs. How would I know where to look in RNA sequences?

Next time, before you state that a sentence "is pure bs", consider applying the principle of charity and wondering whether you might be in the wrong.

Here, you misread. OP said "they look similar" and "they" refers to remdesivir and adenosine, from the prior sentence's clause "Remdesivir is an analog of adenosine".

Re: We Made One Gram Of Remdesivir

#43

Post by aerovistae » Sun, Apr 05, 2020, 5:32 AM UTC

applecrazy wrote: post #29

mjthrowaway1 wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That community has been pretty dead for years. Used to love it.

Is there a successor to this forum? I’m a CS undergrad and kind of want to explore this field.

/r/wallstreetbets :P

Re: We Made One Gram Of Remdesivir

#44

Post by twomoretime » Sun, Apr 05, 2020, 5:34 AM UTC

Vaslo wrote: post #34

In my former life I was a graduate organic chemist, but I “quit” with a Masters. I loved Synthetic Chemistry as an undergrad and thought I wanted a PhD in. There were three lousy things (for me) about the career that made me bail. 1). So many syntheses have horrible yields just like this one. You’d start with grams of material to end up with micrograms. I loved solving these problems as an undergrad in books, but rea…

Your anecdote seems to confirm a number of problems which are ravaging academia at large.

Having gone through a master's myself, I think when we pushed two generations of children into college, we generally lowered the bar - across the board, effectively. And that's related to what's happening in the US today.

Re: We Made One Gram Of Remdesivir

#45

Post by yjftsjthsd-h » Sun, Apr 05, 2020, 5:38 AM UTC

barkingcat wrote: post #18

fg6hr wrote: post #11

That's some really complex mess. How much do these chemists get paid?

If they don't have grants, $0. If they work in a lab for someone who has a grant, $0, but with credit on the papers (that's why there's 35 authors on the paper, 1 person got paid, the rest got name credit in the hopes that they get noticed by a commercial company wanting to monetize this process, so in the future they get their own gig). If they work in a commercial lab, maybe they make a little.

So... Why does anyone do it? We're talking about throwing years of your life at this work; how on earth is it pulling people in if it can't pay bills?

Re: We Made One Gram Of Remdesivir

#46

Post by wesleywt » Sun, Apr 05, 2020, 5:38 AM UTC

Vaslo wrote: post #34

In my former life I was a graduate organic chemist, but I “quit” with a Masters. I loved Synthetic Chemistry as an undergrad and thought I wanted a PhD in. There were three lousy things (for me) about the career that made me bail. 1). So many syntheses have horrible yields just like this one. You’d start with grams of material to end up with micrograms. I loved solving these problems as an undergrad in books, but rea…

You are describing my life. Except I am in biotechnology.

Re: We Made One Gram Of Remdesivir

#47

Post by applecrazy » Sun, Apr 05, 2020, 5:54 AM UTC

aerovistae wrote: post #43

applecrazy wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is there a successor to this forum? I’m a CS undergrad and kind of want to explore this field.

/r/wallstreetbets :P

That’s just trading. Learning quant finance is More than learning how to trade.

Plus, WSB is more of a meme than real education.

Re: We Made One Gram Of Remdesivir

#48

Post by astronautjones » Sun, Apr 05, 2020, 5:57 AM UTC

yjftsjthsd-h wrote: post #45

barkingcat wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If they don't have grants, $0. If they work in a lab for someone who has a grant, $0, but with credit on the papers (that's why there's 35 authors on the paper, 1 person got paid, the rest got name credit in the hopes that they get noticed by a commercial company wanting to monetize this process, so in the future they get their own gig). If they work in a commercial lab, maybe they make a little.

So... Why does anyone do it? We're talking about throwing years of your life at this work; how on earth is it pulling people in if it can't pay bills?

You're locked in at that point

Re: We Made One Gram Of Remdesivir

#49

Post by djaque » Sun, Apr 05, 2020, 5:59 AM UTC

Vaslo wrote: post #34

In my former life I was a graduate organic chemist, but I “quit” with a Masters. I loved Synthetic Chemistry as an undergrad and thought I wanted a PhD in. There were three lousy things (for me) about the career that made me bail. 1). So many syntheses have horrible yields just like this one. You’d start with grams of material to end up with micrograms. I loved solving these problems as an undergrad in books, but rea…

That's kind of my experience with research, but in physics. Already have three projects under my belt w/ no publishable results. All of them involved much more work than the other grad. students in my lab including building like three different instruments from scratch, but the other students have published. Their projects were much more "safe" than mine and their papers are pretty small, but at least they have papers.

Re: We Made One Gram Of Remdesivir

#50

Post by girvo » Sun, Apr 05, 2020, 6:01 AM UTC

Vaslo wrote: post #34

In my former life I was a graduate organic chemist, but I “quit” with a Masters. I loved Synthetic Chemistry as an undergrad and thought I wanted a PhD in. There were three lousy things (for me) about the career that made me bail. 1). So many syntheses have horrible yields just like this one. You’d start with grams of material to end up with micrograms. I loved solving these problems as an undergrad in books, but rea…

> So many failures could be logged so I didn’t waste my time doing non-working or poor yielding reactions

In a different but related world, clandestine chemists share failures more often than they do their successes, at least in the communities I was a part of a very long time ago.

I'd wager this is because our substrates, reagents and solvents are such a pain in the arse to get compared to an actual lab, that wasting any of them is a no-go if it can be avoided.

Related to that, but we reused solvents and recycled material a lot more than I did doing my B.Sci in Chemistry, for the same reasons!