{"id":188971,"date":"2023-10-06T14:46:00","date_gmt":"2023-10-06T14:46:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/c2w-memo.net\/hard-chemistry-beautiful-stories\/"},"modified":"2023-10-06T14:46:00","modified_gmt":"2023-10-06T14:46:00","slug":"hard-chemistry-beautiful-stories","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/c2w-memo.net\/en\/hard-chemistry-beautiful-stories\/","title":{"rendered":"Hard chemistry, beautiful stories"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
The visitors to the Evening of Chemistry enjoyed a varied programme in which the link between chemistry and medicine took centre stage.<\/strong><\/div>\r\n

The Evening of Chemistry descended upon Oss for its eighth edition \u2014 the city of pharmaceutical chemistry. Oss is celebrating the centenary of the founding of Organon in 2023, and with it the birth of this industry in their city. Mayor Wobine Buijs opens the evening in a well-filled Theatre De Lievekamp. Yvonne van der Meer, chair of the KNCV, briefly reflects on the past year. The KNCV celebrated its 120th anniversary and organised the world chemistry congress IUPAC | CHAINS in August. She shows the aftermovie, which gives an excellent impression of the atmosphere. Then comes the official segment: the special appointments. She appoints Floris Rutjes as Honorary Member, in part for his commitment to the congress, and Matthias Bickelhaupt<\/a> as Member of Merit for his involvement in establishing the KNCV section for computational and theoretical chemistry. We then immerse ourselves in a programme shining a spotlight on chemistry and medicine.<\/p>\n

Editor-in-chief Esther Thole takes on the role of presenter and enters into conversation with former Organon archivist Robert van Vlijmen. We see Organon’s first employees processing pig pancreases to extract insulin \u2014 something that bears not the remotest resemblance to today’s pharmaceutical industry. And yet that practice had a distinctly modern edge. Even now, we are once again looking at how to make full use of waste streams from other industries.<\/p>\n\n

Tattoo<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Floris van Delft delivers the first chemically substantive talk. He asks the audience about their favourite molecule and enquires who has even gone so far as to have a tattoo of it. His own favourite is BCN, an eight-membered ring with a triple bond fused to a three-membered ring, making it exceptionally well suited to metal-free click chemistry. It lies at the heart of his company Synaffix, which offers a platform for targeted cancer therapy. He closes his talk by revealing his right arm, which now bears a freshly inked tattoo of BCN: ‘The molecule that changed my life.’<\/p>\n

Then comes the most nerve-wracking part of the evening \u2014 at least for Jitske Bak, Adarsh Kalikadien and Maritza Rovers. They are finalists for the Spotlight Prize and each has three minutes to explain their doctoral research to the audience. Those present then vote for their favourite using coloured cards, with the winner announced later in the evening during the awards gala.<\/p>\n\n

Next up is Patricia Dankers. She too set out to study chemistry in Nijmegen with the intention of joining Organon afterwards. It never came to pass, because during her placement at Eindhoven University of Technology she encountered her favourite molecule \u2014 one capable of forming five hydrogen bonds, making it exceptionally suited to supramolecular chemistry and hydrogels. She uses it to replicate small pieces of kidney tissue, in other words to synthesise natural tissues.<\/p>\n\n

Life-saving<\/strong><\/h3>\n

After the interval, Sjaak Neefjes speaks about doxorubicin \u2014 the most widely used cancer drug, better known in the clinic as ‘toxorubicin’ on account of how harmful it is to the patient. Neefjes is searching for alternatives for patients who have exhausted all other treatment options. On stage, he enters into conversation with a patient who was also treated with doxorubicin but who sought an alternative. Following a deal with doctors from Shanghai, Neefjes receives data allowing him to demonstrate that one of their compounds increases the chance of survival by nearly 30%. The real challenge in producing potentially life-saving medicines of this kind lies in securing funding.<\/p>\n

The awards gala gets under way. The Golden Spatula for the best applied sciences graduation thesis goes to Roy Blom<\/a>, the Golden Master for the best university graduation thesis goes to Milo Cornelissen<\/a>, and Luka Scholtens<\/a> receives the Golden Flame for the best further education graduation report. Maritza Rovers received the most votes from the audience for her pitch about gardening in the lab and is awarded a genuine Golden Spotlight.<\/p>\n

Comedian and mathematician Tobi Kooiman brings the evening to a close. He has the audience laughing in no time with tales of the collisions between his own pure logic and everyday life. A splendid finale to a varied and captivating programme. Those who were there will never forget it \u2014 Oss is the pharmaceutical chemistry capital of the Netherlands.<\/p>\n

The Evening of Chemistry 2024 takes place on 10 October at De Flint in Amersfoort.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\r\n\r\n \n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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