Tracking Water Molecules Could Unlock Secrets

ScienceDaily is reporting that several new discoveries about the simple molecule of water have kicked off a surge in research that scientists believe could lead to solving some of the world's most tricky problems from agriculture to cancer. "Understanding how individual water molecules maneuver in a system to form fleeting tetrahedral structures and how changing physical conditions such as temperatures and pressures affect the amount of disorder each imparts on that system may help scientists understand why certain substances, like drugs used in chemotherapy, are soluble in water and why some are not. It could also help understand how this changing network of bonds and ordering of local tetrahedrality between water molecules changes the nature of protein folding and degradation. 'Understanding hydrophobicity, and how different conditions change it, is probably one of the most fundamental components in understanding how proteins fold in water and how different biomolecules remain stable in it,' says Kumar. 'And if we understand this, we will not only have a new way of thinking about physics and biology but also a new way to approach health and disease.'"

Comments

Finally a cure for DHMO poisoning

[line-bundle]

Perhaps this might lead to finally finding a cure for http://www.dhmo.org/facts.html

Re:Finally a cure for DHMO poisoning

[H0p313ss]

Don't you know that the Oil Companies, Coal Companies, Tobacco Companies, and The Military Industrial Complex all use DHMO?

That's nothing, I have it on good authority that DHMO has been used for years by the FBI, CIA, MOSSAD and of course the KGB.

Of course the conspiracy theorists will try to convince you that rampant DHMO usage stretches back to pre-history involving such figures as Leonardo da Vinci and the Templars and will even pull out Biblical quotations or try to convince you that NASA used it on all manned missions.

When will the madness end?

Re:Finally a cure for DHMO poisoning

[sconeu]

DHMO is nothing compared to the threat that is Oxygen Dihydride (PDF, info on page 3).

Re:Physics anyone?

[skgrey]

Ten points for bringing up quantum mechanics and measuring precision, negative a thousand points for referring to it as a "thingie".

Please

[tsa]

...could lead to solving some of the world's most tricky problems from agriculture to cancer.
 
Please please PR people, come with something more original next time. The solving cancer thing is so old, nobody believes that anymore. And I never knew agriculture was a problem.

Funding needed for research on ...

[PPH]

... the behavior of H2O - C2H5OH solutions. Please expedite. I'm making a run for supplies ASAP.

Re:Physics anyone?

[mcgrew]

Indeed, on the quantum scale it's a "thingette" or "nanothing". Physicists are still arguing over the correct nomenclature.

Re:The Abyss?

[H0p313ss]

We could save ourselves some time and just ask the sea creatures at the bottom of the ocean how they do it.

Deep sea creatures do it under pressure.

Re:Physics anyone?

[Anonymous Coward]

Quantum mechanics is only in effect when considering things even smaller then atoms.

And cats.

Re:Physics anyone?

[thomst]

"And a bird, you cannot change". -- Yoda Skynard

"And this bird, change you cannot". -- Yoda Skynnard

Fixed that for you!