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Not Your Grandfather’s Chemistry

5 February 2017

A robust response to a frequent complaint:

In recent years, the awards of Nobel Prize in Chemistry has generated discontent among some chemists who complain
that more and more the Chemistry Prize is given to biologists, with expressions like "But, is this chemistry?" With all due respect to "chemist" colleagues who ask the question, or the rhetorical comment "Is this chemistry?", when the Chemistry Prize is given for research in biological chemistry, our answer is "Do your homework before asking that question."

Characterization of the enzyme and its reaction mechanism were accomplished by using the following methods: conventional column chromatography, FPLC, HPLC, TLC, MS, NMR, EPR, EM (electron microscopy), X-ray crystallography, UV−vis spectroscopy, fluorescence spectroscopy (conventional), flash photolysis (millisecond), cyclic voltammetry, Photo-CIDNP, ultrafast spectroscopy (absorption and fluorescence up-conversion), and the list goes on. Is this truly chemistry? In the immortal words of ESPN, "C'mon Man!"

Sancar and Zhong, ACS Biochemistry, 56, 1-2 (2017).

 

Read the full article here (Open Access).