Take the blue pill...

"Unfortunately, no one can be told what the Matrix is. You have to see it for yourself. This is your last chance. After this, there is no turning back.

"You take the blue pill and the story ends. You wake in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe. You take the, erm, other blue pill? Crap, CUT SCENE!"



Reference: Christine E. Hay, Frank Marken, G. J. Blanchard, "Solvent-Dependent Changes in Molecular Reorientation Dynamics: The Role of Solvent−Solvent Interactions", doi: 10.1021/jp912217r

????

The question marks really say it all:



Source: N. Wood and G. Stephens, Phys. Chem. Chem. Phys., 2010, 12, 1670 - 1674, doi: 10.1039/b923429b

The fortune-telling porphyrin

Today I learned that porphyrins have secret desires to be ancient Chinese fortune-telling devices.



Reference: Mi Zhou, Zuowei Li, Tiecheng Liu, Peng Zhang, Dapeng Xu and Shuqin Gao, "Stiffness Tunable Molecular Spring Washers: High-Pressure Raman Investigations on Porphyrin Self-Assemblies", J. Phys. Chem. B, doi: 10.1021/jp910676y

Holiday special: Epic science tattoo

For today's holiday special, we look at illustrations of science, not on journal websites or on dead trees, but rather on a much more ancient medium. The Review posts this link to a blog at Discover Magazine that displays this epic science tattoo:


Clearly the tattoo artists have issued the authors of Graphical Abstracts a challenge. Consider this the body art equivalent of a thrown gauntlet.

Today's holiday is The Birthday of Martin Luther King, Jr.

Reference: Carl Zimmer, The Loom - a blog of Discover Magazine, That About Covers It, 2008-06-27.

Chaos in olive oil

Detect lack of quality in olive, otherwise there will be much chaos to pay!



Reference: José S. Torrecilla, Ester Rojo, Juan C. Domínguez and Francisco Rodríguez, "A Novel Method To Quantify the Adulteration of Extra Virgin Olive Oil with Low-Grade Olive Oils by UV−Vis", J. Agric. Food Chem., 2010 58 (3), pp 1679-1684, doi:10.1021/jf903308u

Attack of the Killer Space Cells

"Sensors detect a large bulbous, nebulous object in our immediate vicinity, sir."

"Sir! It's opened fire with its Red Ablative Laser Beam!"


"She cannae take much more of this, Cap'n!"

"Engage sublight engines and initiate evasive manoeuvers!"

I swear, that neuron looks like it's cackling evilly.

Reference: Larry J. Millet, Adriana Bora, Jonathan V. Sweedler and Martha U. Gillette, "Direct Cellular Peptidomics of Supraoptic Magnocellular and Hippocampal Neurons in Low-Density Cocultures", ACS Chem. Neurosci., doi:10.1021/cn9000022

Homologous series

This organic chemist really wants you to step up that pyrazinacene ladder


I can't help but feel like I'm looking at future marketing material for Menards. "Home Improvement - with Science!"

Reference: Gary J. Richards, Jonathan P. Hill, Navaneetha K. Subbaiyan, Francis D’Souza, Paul A. Karr, Mark R. J. Elsegood, Simon J. Teat, Toshiyuki Mori and Katsuhiko Ariga, "" J. Org. Chem., 2009, 74 (23), pp 8914–8923. DOI: 10.1021/jo901832n