Nanotechnology Now - Press Release: "Scientists build wrench 1.7 nanometers wide: Tool allows fundamentally new way to control the shape of molecules"
University of Vermont chemist Severin Schneebeli has invented a new way to use chirality to make a wrench. A nanoscale wrench. His team's discovery allows them to precisely control nanoscale shapes and holds promise as a highly accurate and fast method of creating customized molecules.
This use of "chirality-assisted synthesis" is a fundamentally new approach to control the shape of large molecules--one of the foundational needs for making a new generation of complex synthetic materials, including polymers and medicines.The UVM team's results were presented online, September 9, in the top-ranked chemistry journal Angewandte Chemie.