Chemistry
Speed read: Essential chemical plants
Speed read
From apples to ylang-ylang, the range of scents and flavours that fill Nature’s vast garden of plants are formed chiefly from specific combinations of volatile organic compounds, known collectively as essential oils. For decades the tools used in chemistry were deemed ill-equipped to untangle these complex and unstable mixtures, until Otto Wallach devised ways in…
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The RNA world
Article
The RNA world by Sidney Altman1989 Nobel Prize laureate in chemistry The phrase “The RNA World” was coined by in 1986 in a commentary on the then recent observations of the catalytic properties of various RNAs. The RNA World referred to an hypothetical stage in the origin of life on Earth. During this stage, proteins…
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