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June 2012 Issue 4
The newsletter of the University of Sussex
Chemistry Department
Building on Success
News in brief...
Head of Chemistry wins award for outstanding contributions to
science
Research Grant Success
Professor Geoff Cloke FRS will receive the 2012 Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC)
Sir Geoffrey Wilkinson Award, for his outstanding contributions and original
contributions to synthetic inorganic and organometallic chemistry. He is the
acknowledged world leader in the application of synthesis using metal vapours for the
bulk scale synthesis of new and thought-provoking inorganic molecules.
Geoff says: “It is a great honour to receive this award. Sussex has always had a great
reputation in organometallic chemistry, with the pioneering work of my colleagues
Colin Eaborn, Mike Lappert and John Nixon, and it is a privilege to be able to continue
that tradition.”
“This award is also a tribute to the enthusiasm, skill and dedication of my research
students and research fellows past and present.”
As part of the award, Professor Cloke will deliver four lectures for the RSC over the
next year. They will present his medal at a special symposium built around his lecture.
Professor Geoff
Cloke gets
down to work in
the lab!
Photograph by Alistair
Frey, Sussex
Research Fellow in the
Cloke lab.
Undergraduates and Research
Sussex undergrads win competitive awards to do research
Each summer Sussex Chemistry undergraduates join faculty research groups to
undertake cutting-edge research alongside PhD students and research fellows.
This year three students have won highly competitive summer research scholarships.
Hope Aitchison has been awarded a Nuffield Science Research bursary to work on
“Single molecule spectroscopy of fluorescent proteins: towards super-resolution
imaging in S. Pombe yeast” in the lab of Dr Mark Osborne, Melvyn Ansell secured a
JRA bursary (http://www.sussex.ac.uk/doctoralschool/juniorresearch) to work on “Late
Transition Metal Models for Frustration of Metal→Borane Bonds” in the lab of Dr Ian
Crossley, and Joseph Newcombe won an award from the RSC Analytical Chemistry
Trust Fund to develop “Tools for Improved NMR Analysis and Diagnosis of
Osteoarthritis” in the labs of Prof Mark C Bagley and Dr Iain Day.
Others undergraduates involved in summer research projects this year include:
Aidan Fisher working on Kinetic Studies on the Ligand Metathesis of Gold
Complexes and Edward Davies working on Novel Enantioselective Cyclopropanation
Reactions Involving Chiral Hafnium Complexes both in the Viseux lab; Kayleigh
Logan on Time Dependent Density Functional Theory within the Tamm Dancoff
Approximation in the Cox lab; Jack Hayes on Novel Conjugate Phosphacarbons also
in the Crossley lab; James Pankhurst and Adam Heins on Model Complexes of
Uranium for Operative Closed Carbon Catalysis in the Turner lab; and Eugenia
Geddes Da Filicaia on Organometallic Nanowires and Marketa Suvova on Uranium
Complexes for Activating Carbon Dioxide in the Cloke lab.
Dr John Spencer has been awarded a
3 year AstraZeneca-funded PhD to
work on boron and palladium-mediated
catalysis, and has been awarded
additional postdoctoral funding from
Nanoporetech to continue research
into custom synthesis of molecules for
use in diagnostics.
Hot off the press
Development of Manganese (VI)
Oxidising Agents Soluble in Organic
Solvents. R. Ellis, K.-H. Lee, M.
Ainsworth, A. Kerr, E.M.E. Viseux.
Synlett.
23
(2012)
1371.
The Viseux lab reports the oxidation of
a variety of functional groups
using ammonium salts of manganate
under
mild
conditions. These
manganate salts are soluble in organic
solvents
and
thus
provide
a
methodology
for
chemoselective
oxidation of functional groups and
ultimately
the synthesis of
natural
products.
Chromatographic NMR with size
exclusion chromatography stationary
phases. R. E. Joyce and I. J. Day. J.
Magn. Reson. 220 (2012) 1–7.
The Day lab uses NMR spectroscopy
to investigate the interaction of
polymer molecular weight reference
standards
with
size
exclusion
chromatography stationary phases.
This extends the recently developed
area of "chromatographic NMR" in
which molecular diffusion properties
are modified by the addition of
stationary phases or solvent modifiers
and measured using the DOSY family
of NMR.experiments.
Facile self-assembly of the first
diphosphametacyclophane. Amy J.
Saunders, Ian R. Crossley, Martyn P.
Coles and S. Mark Roe. Chem.
Commun. 48 (2012) 5766–5768.
The Crossley lab communicates the
synthesis of a new class of
phosphorus-containing macrocycles.
This molecule is a bulky ligand that
can bridge multiple metal centres,
making it a potentially useful tool in
developing hindered catalysts for
synthetic transformations; it may also
have scope in ‘molecular recognition’.
Functional analogues and derivatives
are currently being investigated.
2 Sussex Chemistry News
Our Finalists: where next?
School visits
Congratulations to all of our graduating third year BSc and fourth
year MChem students.
Helen Kimber, MChem My time at Sussex has
been the best time of my life. The thing
about the chemistry department at Sussex is
the community. The large staff to student ratio
makes members of the faculty so approachable
that they have not only guided me academically
but also personally. Now that I have reached
the end of my MChem I will be leaving behind
not only inspiring lecturers that will have a lasting impact on the
rest of my academic career but in some cases friends who I hope
will be for life. The highlight of my time at Sussex has been my
theoretical MChem project with Dr Hazel Cox. This has given me
the platform to progress onto a PhD at UCL in Astrochemistry with
Professor Steve Price. This PhD is half funded by UCL and half by
the Max Planck Institute, and gives me the opportunity to spend a
year at Friedrich-Schiller-University of Jena. In this PhD I will be
looking at the reaction conditions of interstellar space and how in
such harsh environments, low pressures and temperatures,
organic molecules can form. I will always have a feeling of loyalty
and fondness for Chemistry at Sussex and I hope one day I will
return.
Kenta Todoroki, BSc Chemistry I really enjoyed studying at
Sussex, but I would have to say that it was tough for me in lectures
and seminars in my first year because, being
Japanese, my English skills had not fully
developed. So it took me significantly longer
to complete assessments than for most other
students and to begin with, my marks were not
always very good. However I’ve now successfully
finished my degree and I really have to thank the
lecturers for their kindness and for helping me
understand chemistry. They always made time for one to one
sessions with me, making sure that I understood the subject; I
think I would not have got through my degree this smoothly if I was
studying somewhere else. I got an amazing job offer from one of
the biggest food companies in Japan during the last spring
vacation. The job is in quality assessment, and also the company
expects me to work internationally, so it is one of my dream jobs.
Studying at Sussex was not only enjoyable, but it also gave me an
opportunity to make my dream come true.
Chemistry Experience Days
100 AS and A2 students attended a Chemistry
th
th
Experience day on June 12 – 13 . Dave Critchley from
Blatchington Mill says
“The school experience day gets a huge thumbs up from
all our students. It allows them to see what being in a
university Chemistry department is like. It really helps
when they come to making Uni applications. The task is
appropriate to what we are doing at sixth form and the
practical session allows them to experience undergrad.
preps at first hand. The analytical sessions in the pm
help them see in action what we’ve only studied in
theory. Our students always come away enthused.”
Life Sciences Taster Day
The first WP Life Sciences Taster Day was held on June
14th for 120 Year 9 students from across Sussex and
London, organised by chemist Dr Hazel Cox. Students
got to take part in hands-on workshops in various fields
from neuroscience to nanoscience and to hear from the
world’s leading expert on bees, Professor Francis
Ratnieks.
Salters’ Chemistry Camp
100 students from schools all over the UK have been
selected to participate in two residential Salters’
Chemistry Camps for 15-year olds at the University of
th
th
Sussex between June 25 and June 29 .The Camps will
enable the students to participate in the fun of chemistry
and motivate them to develop both awareness of and a
long-term interest in the subject through an actionpacked programme.
Prestigious Conferences
Professor Mark Bagley and Dr John Spencer co-chaired a medicinal chemistry
th
meeting on June 12 at the Royal Society of Chemistry entitled "Matchmaking
Ethical Medium Throughput Screening with Chemistry". This meeting is part of
an EPSRC-BBSRC- MRC Collaborative Network in Chemical Biology.
Cardiosulfa: a small molecule probe
for looking at blood vessel formation
in zebrafish discussed at the Medicinal
th
Chemistry meeting on June 12 .
The Salters’
Chemistry Camp
group photo
(Class of 2011) on
the steps of
Chichester
Lecture Theatre.
Sussex Chemistry
will be hosting
the 2012 campers
th
th
June 25 -29 .
Chemistry
Sudoku
Solution
For the previous issue’s puzzle
Dr Iain Day organised and chaired the 5th RSC NMR Discussion Group
th
Postgraduate Symposium at the University of Bristol on June 14 .
Professor Simon Ward has been invited to present at the prestigious
international meeting of the American Chemical Society in August 2012 in
Philadelphia on his work on designing and developing molecules for the
treatment of schizophrenia. The presentation will focus on the challenges of
developing a specific class of drugs to subtly improve neurotransmission.
Sussex Chemistry News is produced by the Chemistry Office with contributions from Chemistry students and faculty, and edited by Dr H Cox, email
[email protected]. If you prefer to receive an electronic copy please email [email protected], or download at www.sussex.ac.uk/chemistry