This makes the biological chemistry so awe-inspiring. Everything is done at about the same body temperature and at the same pressure, just with right catalysts.
We Made One Gram Of Remdesivir
71–80 of 236 posts
Re: We Made One Gram Of Remdesivir
#72In 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…
As someone who spent 4 years working on a PhD (wireless/RF technology) and then quit, your points 2 and 3 ring a lot of bells. I think "journal of failed experiments" is a wonderful idea.
Re: We Made One Gram Of Remdesivir
#73In 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 paper…
What branch of physics? There are hundreds of published null results looking for dark matter or Supersymmetry, for example. Instead of documenting a failed search, the papers focus on what versions of the theories the experiment excludes to 95% confidence.
Re: We Made One Gram Of Remdesivir
#74Remdesivir 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…
This mode of action is fascinating, some HIV medications work in a similar way.
What I’m curious about is why this huge group attached to the adenosine-like group is needed. It seems to be rather complex for being a shoe to be thrown into cellular gear. Do you have an idea or pointer into the mode of action of this group?
Re: We Made One Gram Of Remdesivir
#75In 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…
I sometimes bake stuff. But had problems with one particular recipe. When changed the proportions I always failed. Tried it over and over. Only to find out one of the baking measurements that's over 20 years old showed the correct measure at 1dl but incorrect on 2 and 2.5 dl. And the recipe only worked when I used the incorrect measurement.
Re: We Made One Gram Of Remdesivir
#76In 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…
As someone who spent 4 years working on a PhD (wireless/RF technology) and then quit, your points 2 and 3 ring a lot of bells. I think "journal of failed experiments" is a wonderful idea.
already has existed for some time : https://blogs.plos.org/collections/positively-negative-new-p...
Re: We Made One Gram Of Remdesivir
#77@ebg13 Thank you! That may be the biggest compliment I’ve ever gotten. Derek is the god of carbon as far as I’m concerned. Josh
You missed the reply, but I hope ebg13 finds this! Great writing.
Re: We Made One Gram Of Remdesivir
#78Earlier quoted context omitted.
Here's his most famous article on FOOF (Dioxygen Diflouride) https://blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/archives/2010/02/23/th... It seems there are multiple chemist-author hybrids out there!
Like the story about the SR-71 Blackbird asking for a speed check, I will never not read the FOOF article again when somebody posts the link. ( https://tribunist.com/technology/sr-71-blackbird-pilot-troll... )
Thank you for that link, first time I saw it!
Re: We Made One Gram Of Remdesivir
#79Earlier quoted context omitted.
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 paper…
Don't worry. Instrumentation is a pain for publishing because often it creeps into engineering territory. I spent a year of my PhD trying to get something to work, it didn't and I ended up building an entirely new instrument in the third year. That's how it goes. I know people who came out of their PhDs with five papers (in the UK that's a big deal), but they're in fields where its relatively easy to publish and/or g…
Thanks, that's good to hear. Fortunately I do have two papers in the works right now, one of them from an instrument I made and another from some simulation work.
The engineering really is the crux of the problem. I personally find it very interesting and I feel like an oddity in my department for that. Most other physicists kind of look down on the "e-word" to the point that my advisors made me change references to "engineering challenges" into "experimental challenges" for a conference talk I gave. I'm in a very equipment heavy field too which is why I find it so strange.
What's frustrating though is that sometimes it feels like I'm only doing engineering with no physics in the mix. Hopefully thay will change over the next year though.
Re: We Made One Gram Of Remdesivir
#80This 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…
Reading assembly code is mundane.