Chemistry World

In honor of Nobel week next week, we'll be discussing our picks for the chemistry prize this year, as well as unpicking previous winners and trends in the awards.

Are there certain traits that make a Nobel Prize winner? What's it like to interview a Nobel laureate? And which names are floating around as potential winners this year? I'm Marianna Kneppers, Chemistry World's science media producer, and this is the Chemical Breakdown.

We'll be diving deeper into all of this and more shortly, but first, let's take a look at this week's news from the Chemistry World website.

[gentle music] A new lower temperature solvent-less method to depolymerize acrylic glass into monomers could offer an efficient, more environmentally friendly approach to recycle the material.

The technique was developed by Swiss researchers who demonstrated it could produce high yields of pristine monomers ready for making new acrylic.

For those of you that aren't familiar with the Nobel Prize, each year the Nobel Prize is awarded across five categories, including physiology and medicine, physics, literature, peace, and most importantly, chemistry.

This year, the announcement of the chemistry prize is set for Wednesday, October 7th, and past winners have included metal organic frameworks, which was last year, protein structure prediction and design, and quantum dots.

And we at Chemistry World will have a suite of dedicated content during the week, from a live blog the day of the announcement to loads of articles about the prize and this year's winners, culminating in a live webinar on the Friday featuring a panel of experts closely involved with the research or people who worked with the winners, hopefully.

The scientists-

Chemistry World Magazine.

Yeah, go ahead.

You do it.

Mm.

Just a few months ago.

Chemistry World Magazine, let me read you the headline, "Chemists think they know what happened onboard the Mary Celeste," article by Mason Wakely.

Now of course they heard us do our-

Could it mark the beginning of a new era for cancers that have long been considered impossible to target? And we'll also uncover the chemistry behind the investigation and conservation of the Bayeux Tapestry.

What secrets have scientists already revealed, and what questions about this iconic artifact remain unanswered? I'm Marianna Kneppers, Chemistry World's science media producer, and this is The Chemical Breakdown.

We'll be diving deeper into these stories shortly, but first, let's take a look at this week's news from the Chemistry World website.

[gentle music] A new species of coronavirus discovered in a Brazilian bat provides more support for the theory that the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus, which caused the COVID-19 pandemic, evolved naturally in bats as opposed to the controversial claim that it was engineered in a Chinese lab.

In particular, the virus contains a furin cleavage site, which had not been seen in other bat-derived SARS-related coronaviruses before.

Now, a newly approved drug is changing that picture.

By targeting one of these previously undruggable proteins, the treatment nearly doubled survival times for patients with advanced pancreatic cancer in clinical trials.

How did chemistry help crack one of cancer's toughest targets? Here to explain more, we have Chemistry World's business editor, Phillip Broadwith, and features editor, Neil Withers.