Chemistry Research News
January - July 2016 Edition
Highlights
PhD and Chancellor's medal
Kieran Stockton, New Developments in the Use of Carbohydrates as Chiral Synthons, April 2016 Graduation.
Citations
Value-adding to cellulosic ethanol: Lignin polymers, Chris Fellows, et al., Industrial Crops and Products, 33(2), 259-276 (2011). Link. Cited by 330
Effect of insoluble dietary fibre addition on technological, sensory, and structural properties of durum wheat spaghetti, Chris Fellows, et al., Food Chemistry, 130(2), 209-309 (2012). Link. Cited by 66
Use of ionic liquids in converting lignocellulosic material to biofuels, Tony Vancov, Trevor Brown, et al., Renewable Energy, 45, 1-6 (2012). Link. Cited by 99
Self‐Adjuvanting Multicomponent Cancer Vaccine Candidates Combining Per‐Glycosylated MUC1 Glycopeptides and the Toll‐like Receptor 2 Agonist Pam3CysSer, Brendan Wilkinson, et al., Angewandte Chemie International Edition, 123(7), 1673-1677 (2011). Link. Cited by 73
Total synthesis of homogeneous antifreeze glycopeptides and glycoproteins, Brendan Wilkinson, et al., Angewandte Chemie International Edition, 51(15), 3606-3610 (2012). Link. Cited by 61
Front cover of Organic & Biomolecular Chemistry
Mutagenicity of N-acyloxy-N-alkoxyamides as an indicator of DNA intercalation part 1: evidence for naphthalene as a DNA intercalator, Stephen Glover, et al., Organic & Biomolecular Chemistry, 14, 3699-3714 (2016). Link.
Publications
Synthesis and properties of photoswitchable carbohydrate fluorosurfactants.
Yingxue Hu, Joshua B. Marlow, Rajesh Ramanathan, Wenyue Zou, Hui Geok Tiew, Matthew J. Pottage, Vipul Bansal, Rico F. Tabor and Brendan Wilkinson, Australian Journal of Chemistry, 68(12), 1880-1884 (2016). Link.
Carbohydrate-based surfactants as photocontrollable inhibitors of ice recrystallization.
Madeleine K. Adam, Jessica S. Poisson, Yingxue Hu, Geethika Prasannakumar, Matthew J. Pottage, Robert N. Ben and Brendan Wilkinson, RSC Advances, 6, 39240-39244 (2016). Link.
Dane Lyddiard, Graham L Jones, Ben Greatrex, FEMS Microbiology Letters, 363(8) (2016). Link.
Teaching Undergraduate Chemistry by Distance and On-line: Lessons from the Front Line.
Peter Lye and Erica Smith, in Teaching Science On-line: Practical Guidance for Effective Instruction and Lab Work, edited by Dietmar Kennepohl, Stylus Publishing, 2016, ISBN-10: 1620361876. Li
Mutagenicity of N-acyloxy-N-alkoxyamides as an indicator of DNA intercalation part 1: evidence for naphthalene as a DNA intercalator.
Tony M. Banks, Samuel F. Clay, Stephen Glover and Rhiannon R. Schumacher, Organic & Biomolecular Chemistry, 14, 3699-3714 (2016). Link.
Stephen Glover and Rhiannon R. Schumacher, Mutation Research/Genetic Toxicology and Environmental Mutagenesis, 795, 41-50 (2016). Link.
Grants
Awarded
Scale-forming Oxalate Salt Nucleation in the Presence of Polycarboxylate Scaling Inhibitors. Use of small and wide angle scattering beamline at the Australian Synchrotron, Chris Fellows with Chris Garvey (ANSTO), May 2016
Applications
Carbonate Variability and Oyster Decline in the Wallis Lake Region, NSW Environmental Trust, Christina McGraw (PI) with Symon Dworjanyn (Southern Cross University) and Maria Byrne (University of Sydney)
Carbonate Chemistry of NSW estuaries and oyster habitat, NSW Environmental Trust, Christina McGraw with Maria Byrne (PI, University of Sydney)
Applications ...
Predicting pollution movement in NSW catchments for risk mitigation, NSW Environmental Trust, Susan Wilson (PI), M Tighe, Darren Ryder, Sara Mica (UNE), Bill Maher (University of Canberra), Tim Cohen (University of Wollongong)
Forms, associations and availability of emerging contaminants in soil and sediment: Understanding antimony (Sb) and germanium (Ge), Australia-Germany Joint Research Cooperation Scheme, Susan Wilson, Steven Doherty (UNE) Birgit Daus, Franz Lehmann (Helmholtz Institute)
Sugarcane Profitability: New Clarifier Technology, Advance Queensland Innovation Partnership program, William Doherty, Hakane Bakir (QUT), Chris Fellows
Conference presentations
Active Learning in Chemistry: The Changing Role of the Lecture Slot.
Erica Smith, Tony Haymet 60th Birthday Symposium, SCRIPPS Institute, La Jolla, USA, 13 March 2016.
Reaching the Regions.
Erica Smith, RACI Chemical Education Division Symposium 2016, Monash University, Melbourne, Australia, 31 March - 1 April 2016. Link.
Remote chemistry laboratory to enhance science learning and access.
Andrew Wallace, Trevor Brown, RACI Chemical Education Division Symposium 2016, Monash University, Melbourne, Australia, 31 March - 1 April 2016. Link.
A multi-sensor system for the direct measurement of Ω, pH, and carbonate.
Christina McGraw, Wayne D.N. Dillon, Hugh L. Doyle, Peter Dillingham, Peter Lye, Philip W. Boyd, Catriona L. Hurd. 4th International Symposium on the Ocean in a High-CO2 World, Hobart, Tasmania, Australia, 3 - 6 May 2016. Link.
Disposable sensors for soil, urine, and seawater.
Christina McGraw, RUN Regional Futures Conference. Rockhampton, Queensland, 21 - 24 June. Link.
Research students
Graduation, April 2016
Kieran Stockton: New Developments in the Use of Carbohydrates as Chiral Synthons, PhD and Chancellor’s medal.
Edward Ledingham: Synthesis of Nitroxide-coupled Sentans for Treatment of Subarachnoid Haemorrhage, BSc(Honours).
Cameron Press: Macrocyclic Tetrabenzimidazole Metal Complexes: The Effects of Cavity Size and Donor Group, BSc(Honours).
Josh Henderson: The synthesis of anticancer Ras/Raf inhibitors from the biomass derivative (-)-levoglucosenone, BPharm (Honours).
Jane Lee: A review of oxa- and aza-substituted bi-cyclooctanes in the medicinal chemistry literature, BPharm.
Petra Davis: Isolation and derivitisation of the antineoplastic isoflavones osajin and pomiferin, BPharm(Honours).
PhD Completions
Laura Williams: Ecology and management of non-native Poa annua on sub-Antarctic Macquarie Island: Application of the herbicide glyphosate as a management option. This PhD tested the application of the herbicide glyphosate as a management option.
Commencing
Nabeel Alzuwaid: Utilisation of Protein Fractions from Durum Wheat Bran, Germ and Other Sources to Improve the Nutritional and Functional Value of Durum Wheat Pasta, PhD, January 2016.
Edward Ledingham: Synthesis of novel organocatalysts using renewable chemical synthons, PhD, January 2016.
Ellis Moore: Desymmetrisation of meso-endoperoxides using organocatalysis, BSc(Honours), February 2016.
Atefeh Esmaeli: Bioremediation of Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbon (PAHs) contaminated soils: Quantifying treatment effects on microbial communities, bioavailability and ecotoxicity for safe soil reuse. PhD, March 2016
Sajanee Gunadasa: Risks of Cd and As in Sri Lankan soils. PhD, March 2016
Engagement & impact
Compounds Australia
UNE is now a member of the Compounds Australia repository, which securely stores and curates sample libraries submitted by Australian based chemists and makes these compounds available at low cost in flexible screening and assay-ready formats to academic and not-for-profit researchers. This membership will increase opportunities to establish collaborations between UNE based researchers and biologists accessing our novel libraries.
Research engagement
Ben Greatrex attended the NMR Open Day at the Eskitis Institute for drug discovery, Griffith University, 8 February 2016. UNE researchers have access to the 800 MHz NMR at Griffith. This is part of the 2015 ARC Linkage Grant, where UNE received a $650K, 500 MHz NMR, now installed in the Riggs Chemistry building.
Christina McGraw ran a 3-day pre-symposium workshop, Chemical, biological, and statistical considerations for ocean acidification experiments, which brought together 35 early career researchers from around the world. Hobart, Tasmania, 28 April - 2 May 2016.
Susan Wilson and Matt Tighe represented UNE at a Community Meeting with stakeholders of the Macleay River Catchment for communication of research on Sb and As contamination in the catchment, June 2016.
External Collaborations
Ben Greatrex with Tony Duncan and Warwick Raverty (Circa Group): Development of biomass derived (-)-levoglucosenone for the construction of chiral materials.
Christina McGraw with Sergio Granados-Focil (Clark University, Worcester, MA) and Aleks Radu (Keele University, UK): Development of new ionophores and ionic liquids for ISEs.
Christina McGraw with Linn Hoffmann (University of Otago): Impact of ocean global climate change on phytoplankton.
Christina McGraw with Catriona Hurd and Philip Boyd (University of Tasmania): New instrumentation to study the image of climate change on the oceans.
Trevor Brown with David Wang (School of Chemical Engineering, The University of Queensland): Adsorption uptake and thermodynamics.
Peter Lye with Paul Smith and Eric Wilkes (The Australian Wine Research Institute (AWRI), Adelaide). The collaboration is in conjunction with Leah McDonald’s PhD project which is looking at the role of metal complexes formed in wine and in the production of unpleasant volatile sulphur compounds post bottling.
Internal Collaborations
Katherine Harris and Peter Lye with others across UNE, The development of context based adaptive tutorials for introductory chemistry.
Susan Wilson, Matt Tighe and the Pollution Science Research Group at UNE. Management of critical stressors affecting plant, soil and water conditions to achieve environmental balance.
Our people
Michelle Taylor: Congratulations! A baby girl, Jessica, January 2016.
Stephen Glover: Adjunct Professor of Chemistry, UNE, re-appointed May 2016.
Brendan Wilkinson: Lecturer in Chemistry, UNE, commenced June 2016.
Rhiannon Schumacher: Manager at Laverty Pathology, Armidale, commenced June 2016.
