Session 144

The Air That I (actually) Breath: A Look at Air Pollution Indoors

Nina Notman
17:30, Tuesday 19 November 2019

Public awareness of urban and other outdoor air pollution is – finally – skyrocketing. But how many of us have every thought about what we inhale indoors where we, on average, do 90% of our breathing? A growing number of air pollution researchers are taking their analytical instruments indoors and measuring exactly what inhabits the air within our homes and other inside environments. In this talk, I will introduce some of these projects and discuss the significance of their findings. I predict that attendees will never look at a toaster in the same dispassionate way again!

CPS Members: Free of charge
Non CPS Members: £2 charge on the door, or purchase CPS membership at £7.50 or £10 with a colour changing mug (valid for your entire degree)
Members of the public: £2 charge on the door.
DISCLAIMER: If there is a high demand priority will be given to CPS members.

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Lyocell Fibres – A Sustainable Solution?

Jim Taylor
17:30, Tuesday 26 November 2019

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One for the Road: What Happens When the Drink-Drive Limit is Lower?

Hilary Hamnett
17:30, Tuesday 3 December 2019

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Next Generation Super-Resolution Microscopy

Dr Izzy Jayasinghe
17:30, Tuesday 10 December 2019

Adaptations of the next generation of super-resolution microscopy: lessons learnt from imaging intracellular signalling nanodomains.

This talk outlines a decade of research which has utilised s
ingle molecule localisation microscopy to study intracellular ‘nanodomains’ which form the structural units of calcium
signalling seen in muscle cells. Adaptation of chemical photo-switching of aromatic fluorescent labels in the early experiments allowed me and my colleagues to produce paradigm-shifting super-resolution images of nanodomains of the heart over a decade ago. However, over the last few years, there has been a wave of newer super-resolution imaging methods which have transcended the level of spatial detail (resolution) in imaging nanodomains.
We are now able to map the precise positions of the ion channels and regulatory proteins, quantify protein co-clustering at single-protein precision, and identify their individual biochemical signatures.
This talk will detail the adaptation of DNA-PAINT, Enhanced Expansion Microscopy and sandSTORM, techniques which exploit the chemical and material properties of DNA, acrylamide-base hydrogels and fluorescent nano-diamonds in recent experiments which have discovered molecular-scale remodelling of nanodomains in pathologies such as right heart failure.

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Directions for Catalysts: Biofuels to Self-Healing Planes

Prof. Duncan Wass
18:15, Tuesday 2 October 2018

Catalysts are the technology at the heart of the majority of industrial chemical processes, their ability to selectively and efficiently convert simple chemical building blocks into more advanced materials being crucial in these processes. This lecture will present two new directions for catalysts from my research group. Firstly, the discovery of catalysts for the upgrading of simple alcohols such as (bio) methanol and ethanol into drop-in replacements for liquid fuels such as petrol will be described. We have extended this technology to be tolerant to real fermentation broths, using alcohols drinks such as beer as a model feedstock. Secondly, we have been working on the development of self-healing carbon fibre reinforced composite materials of the type widely used in aerospace applications. Again, catalysts are the technology at the heart of achieving new materials that can repair themselves with almost full recovery of mechanical properties.

Molecules of Murder

Dr. John Emsley
18:15, Tuesday 9 October 2018

This talk is about the nefarious molecules with which murderers and assassins have carried out their crimes, hoping always to escape detection. Yet many such deadly molecules have long been known, and many were once widely used by doctors to treat diseases. Murders committed with them posed problems for those who would bring the murderers to justice, and chemists were to provide essential evidence. More recently, secret agents assumed that newer deadly poisons could not be detected, like that used to kill Georgi Markov in London in 1978, Alexander Litvinenko in London in 2006, and Alexander Perepilichny in Weybridge in 2014. It was then up to forensic teams in the UK to discover what they had used.

Urban Water Fingerprinting to Inform of the Environment & Health

Dr. Barbara Kasprzyk-Hordern
18:15, Tuesday 16 October 2018

A new approach in public health epidemiology utilizing urban water fingerprinting with hyphenated mass spectrometry techniques has been recently pioneered to provide near real-time measurements of public health. Urban water fingerprinting provides anonymised but comprehensive and objective information on the health status of a population and surrounding environment in real time as urban water (sewerage system and receiving aqueous environment) pools the endo- and exogenous biomarkers of that population.
This cutting-edge approach of extracting epidemiological information from urban water emerged from Wastewater-Based Epidemiology (WBE). WBE was developed in a strong cross-sectoral and transdisciplinary collaborative ethos within SCORE (www.score-cost.eu) and SEWPROF teams (www.sewprofitn.eu), and although still in its infancy, WBE is currently used to report on community-wide illicit drug use trends and feeds into the Europe-wide evidence based early warning system by European Agency for Drugs and Drug Addiction (http://www.emcdda.europa.eu/wastewater-analysis).
This talk will introduce the concept and its rapid advances. It will focus on pharmacologically active compounds in urban water and their stereochemistry in the context of environmental risk assessment. It will also explore new avenues in the utilization of urban water fingerprinting in the assessment of population health and health risk prediction.

Mental Images & Memory Processes as Targets for Cocaine Use

Dr. John Marsden
18:15, Tuesday 23 October 2018

Addiction is caused by exposure and physical and mental adaptation. Addiction is treatable; but some disorders have proved resistant to medications and psychological therapies. Focusing on cocaine use disorder (CUD), John Marsden will outline learning processes that underpin and maintain CUD and describe the rationale, procedures, preliminary evidence and implications of a novel cognitive therapy.

Smart Materials

Dr. Anna Ploszajski
18:15, Tuesday 13 November 2018

Smart materials allow solid objects to sense, adapt, morph and respond to their environment. Properties like shape and colour become transient upon changes like temperature, light levels, moisture, pressure or magnetism. Many examples of smart materials exist today, but their widespread adoption has been limited. In this talk, award-winning materials engineer Dr Anna Ploszajski will explore why these remarkable materials have proven so difficult to handle, and where we might expect to see them impact our lives in the future.

Mind Reading and Interpersonal Attraction

Dr. Peter Mitchell
18:15, Tuesday 20 November 2018

Most humans are good at mindreading, meaning that they are adept in interpreting signals in other's behavior to infer the cause of that behavior. The behavior in question has a proximal cause (an inner state, such as something the person is thinking), which in turn is related with a distal cause (an event in the world that triggered them to think of something in particular). The research I will present will demonstrate that people are surprisingly skilled at inferring the distal cause of others' behavior, suggesting by implication that they can infer others' inner states. Some people are easier to "read" than others. Recent evidence suggests that people who are easy to read also tend to be perceived as being likeable or interpersonally attractive.

Age-Related Changes in Synaptic Transmission in Cognitive Design

Dr. Stephen Brickley
18:15, Tuesday 27 November 2018

Cognitive decline is considered an inevitable consequence of ageing with human brain-imaging studies suggesting that functional changes in connectivity underlies this decline. My laboratory is exploring the hypothesis that cognitive decline is caused by changes in the number and/or the strength of synaptic connections. I will briefly describe the longitudinal behavioural strategies we use to monitor changes in cognitive performance. I will then introduce the automated two-photon imaging and 3D tomography techniques we have developed to trace neuronal connections. Finally, I will discuss the feasibility of combining mGRASP (mammalian GFP reconstitution across synaptic partners) with optogenetics to reveal age-related differences in the synaptic weighting of defined neuronal projections. The aim of this work is to better understand the changes taking place in the brain that could explain the inevitable cognitive decline that is associated with ageing.

Molecules in Space: Our Astrochemical Origins

Dr. Catherine Walsh
18:15, Tuesday 4 December 2018

Molecules are found everywhere in space: in cold and dense clouds in the interstellar medium of galaxies, in planet-forming disks around young stars, and in the atmospheres of hot gas-giant exoplanets. The field of astrochemistry brings together astronomers, physicists, and chemists working on observations, theory, and experiments to increase our understanding of the chemistry that occurs under the extreme conditions in space, and to exploit the information contained within observations that can reveal the chemical, physical, and dynamical properties of astrophysical environments. In this talk I will describe how the origin of complexity seen in our Solar System and that has been exposed in the molecular inventory of comets, has its heritage in the exotic chemistry that happens in the coldest and most quiescent region in space, the interstellar medium. Along the way, I will present results from state-of-the-art space missions and telescopes that are uncovering our astrochemical origins.

Mercury: Window on the Invisible

Professor Andrea Sella
18:15, Tuesday 1 October 2019

Synopsis to come shortly.....

Meet in the Nyholm Room of Christopher Ingold Building from 17:45 for Tea, Coffee and Doughnuts.
The talk will take place in the Ramsay LT at 18:15.
Join us after the talk for Wine, Cheese and Pizza!

Stop Thinking Like Chemists & Start Thinking Like Chefs!

Ross Campbell
18:15, Tuesday 8 October 2019

How to Discover a New Element

Kit Chapman
17:45, Tuesday 15 October 2019

Creating a superheavy element is no easy feat. It's the equivalent of firing six trillion bullets a second at a needle in a haystack, hoping the bullet and needle somehow fuse together, then catching it in less than a thousandth of a second - after which it's gone forever.
Join Kit Chapman as he reveals how the heaviest elements are made and the incredible stories that led to their discovery.
Why did the US Air Force fly planes into mushroom clouds?
How did an earthquake help give Japan its first element?
And where will the periodic table end?

The Problem With Lab Horror Stories

Charles Harrison
17:30, Tuesday 22 October 2019

All chemists love telling their health and safety horror stories. Tales of near misses and explosions are a sure fire hit for conferences or impressing other scientists. But with lab safety
more in the spotlight than ever do they do more harm than good?
Charles Harrison will explore the sometimes strained relationship between exciting stories and practical health and safety through his own horror stories and the road to becoming a safety advisor.

Careers Evening

Multiple Speakers
17:30, Tuesday 29 October 2019

Why You Should Care About the Stratosphere

Simon Clark
17:30, Tuesday 12 November 2019

The stratosphere is a fascinating place; a lid on the turbulent lower atmosphere, a realm of alien dynamics that defy our everyday experiences, and home to the most violent events in the entire atmosphere. Every now and again the stratosphere reaches down and completely changes the weather we experience on the surface. When the stratosphere comes into town, extreme weather changes lives for many of us. It may well play a key role in the single most dangerous experiment humanity ever attempts. So, in short, you really should understand a bit more about what’s going on up there.

In this talk I will give an introduction to the key features, dynamics, and impacts of the stratosphere. In particular I’ll be discussing sudden stratospheric warmings and their impacts on surface weather, the subject of my PhD, and also the potential use of the stratosphere in geoengineering

Why We Must Change the Drug Laws to Liberate Research and Treatment

Professor David Nutt, Imperial College London
18:15, Tuesday 8 January 2019

Professor Nutt will argue that the drug laws as codified in the UN Conventions are the worst censorship of research in the history of science. For over 50 years, they have denied many opportunities for innovative treatments, many of which were established in the 1950s and 60s. Worse, they have probably increased rather than decreased the harms of drug use. He will give examples of all these and show how himself and others are beginning to move the field forward with neuroscience research.

Dr. Lizzy Ostler, University of Brighton

Will Red Wine and Chocolate Really Keep You Young and Healthy?
18:15, Tuesday 15 January 2019

There is growing evidence that many of the deleterious processes of ageing, such as heart disease, dementia and arthritis, could be prevented or remediated by simple chemical compounds. Recent work has demonstrated that the removal or alteration of phenotype of senescent cells has the potential to reduce multiple age-related pathologies. The development of orally-available broad-spectrum anti-degenerative medicines is now a realistic goal. A wide variety of polyphenolic natural products, often isolated from “super-foods” including grapes and cocoa beans, have long been identified as potential lead compounds for anti-ageing therapeutics. However, many such compounds have multiple biological activities, and may be poorly absorbed. We have established simple, robust and high-yielding syntheses to facilitate access to a broad range of structural variants of compounds based on Resveratrol, and subjected this panel of “Resveralogues” to a wide variety of in vitro assays, with a particular focus on activities related to cell growth and senescence. A subset of our compounds is able to “rejuvenate” cultures of senescent cells by altering RNA splicing patterns, lengthening telomeres, and enabling a significant fraction of cells to re-enter normal cell cycle. The implications of this novel mechanism for the design of future anti-degeneratives will be presented.

Perfume = Chemistry + Artistry: An Interactive Talk

Ruth Mastenbroek, Ruth Mastenbroek Fragrances
18:15, Tuesday 22 January 2019

(Perfume smelling interactive talk). Ruth will show some key synthetic ingredients that have changed the world of perfume, and talk about how she went from being an Oxford Chemistry graduate to the only independent perfumer in Britain today.

The Science of Climate Change – and what we can do about it.

Professor Joanna Haigh, Imperial College London
18:15, Tuesday 29 January 2019

Since the industrial revolution the surface temperature of the Earth has increased by about 1°C and climate scientists are overwhelmingly of the opinion that this largely due to the effect of gases released into the atmosphere by human activities. How can we be sure that this is the case?  Does it matter?  What can we say about the future? In this talk Jo Haigh will outline the evidence for climate change, in temperature and other measures, globally and regionally in the context of natural variations in climate, and she will discuss what is well known and what less certain. She will describe how the climate reflects a delicate balance between the energy coming in from the Sun and the heat energy leaving Earth for space, and how this can be disrupted by increasing concentrations of “greenhouse gases”, especially carbon dioxide (CO₂).  She will show how basic physical science can be used to construct computer models of the climate which can then be employed to investigate how climate processes work and what increasing CO₂ may mean for the future. The talk will conclude with a discussion around different approaches to tackling climate change and where the world is heading following the recent United Nations climate conferences.

The Rise and Fall (and Rise Again?) of Probiotics

Dr Linda Thomas
18:15, Tuesday 5 February 2019

The talk describes how the probiotic concept developed and was commercialised. It will explain how probiotics became popular and why the word ‘probiotic’ started to disappear from commercial use. It will finish by explaining why Linda believes this type of product will re-emerge, because of the critical effects of the gut microbiota on health, throughout life.

The First Prize Medal for Science: The Origin of the Royal Society’s Copley Medal

Dr. Rebekah Higgitt, University of Kent
18:15, Tuesday 19 February 2019

It has become common for exceptional achievements, including within science,​ to be rewarded with a prize medal. The ubiquity of prize medals for science today means that the history of the first, the Copley Medal, has been overlooked. Rather than simply noting the exploits of famous winners - such as Franklin, Priestley and Herschel - this talk explores the creation of a novelty and the meaning of medals to the Royal Society's 18th-century fellows. The scheme required an investment of time, money, thought and skill, and the creation of a design that borrowed from contemporary ideas about experimental philosophy, antiquarianism and Freemasonry. The Copley Medal did not arrive fully formed as a reward system, but accrued meaning and value from its associations.

3D Printing and its Applications Across Pharmacy and Chemical Synthesis

Dr Stephen Hilton, University College London
18:15, Tuesday 26 February 2019

This lecture describes the use of 3D printing and its applications in the fields of Chemistry and Pharmacy. This lecture covers our experience of 3D printing and how it changed our research in chemical synthesis and drug delivery. The implications for this and its facilitation of cross-disciplinary research will be described.

Measuring the Dark Web

Cerys Bradley, University College London
18:15, Tuesday 5 March 2019

The Dark Web is a hidden part of our world populated by anonymous users and unknown to search engines. How then, do researchers understand this space? PhD student Cerys Bradley will discuss their research on Dark Net Markets and their role in the online drugs trade and describe how you conduct research on a population deliberately trying to remain hidden. This talk is intended for an audience with little to no prior knowledge of the Dark Web and contains a small interactive element for willing participants.

In Vino Veritas (et Moleculis)

Dr Stephen Potts (Presidential Lecture)
18:15, Tuesday 19 March 2019

Some might say wine is a solution to problems, but in truth it is simply just a solution. Many of the flavours and textures in the glass come from what chemists know and love: molecules! This talk will take you through the molecules responsible for the acidity, sweetness and flavour of wine, including aromas that are typical of specific grape varieties, the production process itself and wine faults. There will be an opportunity to sniff some of the molecules in question, so come with a clear mind and nostrils!