Many molecules come in two forms that are mirror images, a bit like our left and right hands. This is important for manufacturing medicines. One variant of a drug might have the desired effect in the body, while its counterpart does little, or even causes harm. The 2026 Nobel prize in chemistry has been awarded to researchers who developed chemical reactions that produce only one version of such molecules.
Matthew Addicoat, from Nottingham Trent University, says these molecular variants are also essential to life. Amino acids, the chemical building blocks of proteins, are “left handed”. The work by this year’s chemistry laureates may help explain how this first happened on the early Earth.
Meanwhile, there’s bad news for coffee lovers: the price of a latte looks like it could soon go up. It’s a knock-on effect of the rising cost of gas and electricity for small businesses.
And for millions of years, parasitic worms had to survive inside animals without being destroyed by their hosts’ immune systems. Scientists are now trying to learn the worms’ tricks to see whether they can be turned into treatments for diseases caused by overactive immune systems.
