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Better Living Through Chiral Chemistry
Atario writes "A long time ago, I remember reading in some science magazine that someone had the bright idea of using enantiomers (the two forms of asymmetrical molecules, like left- and right-handed versions of the same one) to make zero-calorie sugar -- turns out, in general, that sugars are all asymmetrical, and everything generates and uses only one of the two chiralities (handednesses) for each one. If we consume a mirrored version of, say, sucrose, we might get all of the sweet but none of the calories. Sweet-tooths rejoice! But nothing ever came of it. Now, however, Wired has an interesting article that explains what the holdup has been and indicates the logjam may break soon, but, as it turns out, in a non-synthetic, albeit nonzero-calorie, way."
For once, a patent would appear to be supporting innovation. An individual with an idea sees the potential, files a patent, and goes on a quest to commercialize the product. There could be no better case study of how patent law is supposed to encourage innovation.
But alas, it's not to be. From the article:
The patent on tagatose as an additive expires in 2006, the two patents on production methods a few years later. [Inventor Gilbert] Levin hopes to see his sugar substitute flood the market before then.
Meanwhile, the current silliness at the patent office will help ensure that Levin will join the legions of brilliant inventors with "died nearly destitute" included somewhere in their epitaphs. Instead of an individual getting his due from an actual original thought, big corporations are set to reap millions from ridiculous "business method" patents. Again, from the article:
Kellogg's obtained a patent in 2002 to use tagatose in "improved sucrose-free, noncarcinogenic, reduced-calorie, insulin-independent" sweet cereals. Wrigley and Kraft have patents of their own.
It's situations like this that make me glad to be a wage slave, with all my original ideas signed over to my own^h^h^hemployer.
Stressed? Me? Of course not. Stress is what a rubber band feels before it breaks, silly.
Some compounds are listed as d- and l- refer to the highest-numbered asymmetric stereogenic centers. They also do not indicate the sign of rotation of plane-polarized light.
Most interesting organic compounds have multiple stereogenic centers. One of the main reasons plants are used to obtain starting materials for various modern drugs, ergot infested rye (indole substrate), poppies, indica sativa all provide starting points that make it so that creating synthetic materials based on these plant extracts as starting reagents is far easier due to the fact plant enzymes can place each stereogenic center in the right conformation and in wet chemistry this is exceedingly difficult. Mentioning some of the starting plants for illicit drugs is no mistake; they are notoriously sensitive to chiral conformation, and provide some of the most interesting sterochemical research subject matter. Also, due to the draconian laws surrounding federally controlled substances and their precursors, it isn't easy to study these things, despite being hugely important.
To say that stereochemistry is limited to 2-handedness is a ridiculous oversimplification of reality. If I'm not mistaken, C6-H12-O6 "glucose"; has D-glucose has 4 chiral carbon atoms (2^4 = 16 possible stereoisomers) - I believe only one of which is able to provide calories.
Various notations for stereochemistry exist, and one must factor out canonical conformations and take into account the bending of the various stereogenic centers in 3d-space, leading to notations that include "boat" and "chair."
Now, as to the practicality of stereogenics and its use in zero calorie metabolism: this is probably less difficult than separating U238 and U235, but one could probably get an enzyme of modify bacteria to plunk out zero-cal conformations, but in large scale synthetic operations, getting picky with chirality could be problematic / costly. Things are ridiculously hard to separate, and you need to use special techniques such as using tartrate salts and other expensive and slow ways of picking out the various conformations of chiral compounds.
Legalize the constitution. Think for yourself question authority.
..."Lightly Sarcastic" division.
No one is saying they can't not eat something. They just want to. Anything wrong with that? If science can provide a way to do so with no (or less) negative side-effects, where's the harm?
Saying "never mind technological advances, concentrate on getting along with the way things are" results in stagnation. If it weren't for human vices such as laziness and gluttony, we'd still be walking from cave to cave every morning to assemble our spear-hunting parties for the day.
Why do you drive a car, or ride a bike, or take a train, or use a computer or a telephone? To avoid all the tedium of the alternatives -- a.k.a. laziness.
Why do you buy food at the grocery store instead of growing and/or hunting your own? To avoid all the hard labor and time consumption of farming and ranching -- a.k.a. laziness -- and because you'd never be able to make enough of the foods you like -- a.k.a. gluttony -- and because hunting can be dangerous -- a.k.a. cowardice.
Why do you seek a better job or business than the one you have? Because you want more money -- a.k.a. greed.
The list goes on. Human weaknesses drive human progress.
"A great democracy must be progressive or it will soon cease to be a great democracy." --Theodore Roosevelt