Chemistry

Researchers using a new chemical process have converted the cellulose in sawdust into hydrocarbon chains, building blocks for gasoline. Cellulose is the main substance in plant matter and is present in all non-edible plant parts of wood, straw, grass, co ...

Article - News Staff - Nov 25 2014 - 10:55am

Science Enters The Brown Versus White Bread Battle

Dietary masochists say you should endure the most difficult brown bread imaginable because 1,000 years ago people had no choice. It's vaguely healthier, we are all told, though if you read more than a few epidemiology studies and saw the lack of metho ...

Article - News Staff - Nov 28 2014 - 10:00am

The Changing World Of Perfume: Why Some Chemicals Are Being Removed

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Article - The Conversation - Nov 29 2014 - 3:00pm

Science Of Structure: Why I’m Proud To Be A Crystallographer

When looked at the right way, even cement can be beautiful. This is the crystal structure of tricalcium aluminate, a vital mineral in cement. By Helen Maynard-Casely, Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation ...

Article - The Conversation - Dec 9 2014 - 11:18am

Silica-Based Carbon-trapping 'Sponges' Can Cut Greenhouse Gases

Current carbon capture schemes are not really ready for prime time, plagued by toxicity, corrosiveness and inefficiency, but a team of chemists have invented low-toxicity, highly effective carbon-trapping "sponges" that could lead to increased u ...

Article - News Staff - Dec 16 2014 - 1:08pm

Is Honey More Toxic Than Table Sugar?

A new study finds that fructose is bad. Biologists who fed mice sugar in doses proportional to what many people eat found that the ratio of fructose and glucose in high-fructose corn syrup was more toxic than than random variations found in sucrose (tabl ...

Article - News Staff - Jan 7 2015 - 9:30am

Hate BPA? Scared Of BPS? Chitosan May Be Your Food Packaging Of The Future

Bisphenol A, known as BPA, is in the middle of an environmental culture war and a hurriedly-rushed replacement, Bisphenol S (BPS), is just as big a concern. We need plastic, food items are covered in plastic to make them last longer and protect them from ...

Article - News Staff - Jan 13 2015 - 11:59am

Physics Or Chemistry? Does Dust Create The Seeds Of Precipitation In Clouds?

Image: Jeff Kubina via flickr, CC BY BY Jyoti Madhusoodanan, Inside Science (Inside Science)-- Showers fall to Earth’s surface as rain, snow, sleet or hail. But high in the clouds, water molecules often begin to come together as tiny ice crystals tha ...

Article - Inside Science - Jan 12 2015 - 9:00am

Alternative Milk: Are You Pouring Unnatural Additives On Your Cereal?

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Article - The Conversation - Jan 14 2015 - 10:22pm

Bisphenol A And Hyperactivity: A Fishy Story

By Ian Musgrave, Senior lecturer in Pharmacology at University of Adelaide. A paper has just been released that will raise health concerns about Bisphenol A again. The paper, “ Low-dose exposure to bisphenol A and replacement bisphenol S induces precociou ...

Article - The Conversation - Jan 16 2015 - 11:57am