Scottish chemists hope to cause a positive reaction when they discuss their latest work at the University of Dundee.
Organic chemists from across Scotland will attend the 31st Royal Society of Chemistry, Perkin Division Scottish Regional Meeting on Wednesday, 18 December.This important annual gathering, hosted in the School of Life Sciences, consists of a series of short papers from academic staff at each of the participating universities, together with a poster session where research students and post-docs may present their latest research. The highlight of the meeting will be the plenary lecture presented by Professor Richard Schmidt from the University of Konstanz, Germany, who is an international authority in the area of oligosaccharide chemistry.
The Perkin Division includes chemists whose interests embrace all kinds of synthetic organic chemistry, as well as the study of relationships between molecular structure and biological activity, natural products, and kinetic and mechanistic phenomena. Talks at the forthcoming meeting will feature a range of these topics, for example, the development of new methods in metal-mediated organic synthesis, from Prof. Billy Kerr of the University of Strathclyde, and the study of the possible biological function of marine natural products, from Dr Marcel Jaspars of the University of Aberdeen.
In the Division of Biological Chemistry and Molecular Microbiology at Dundee, the study and synthesis of various natural products (peptides, oligosaccharides, and nucleic acids) are areas of particular research interest.
The meeting has been organised by members of the Division of Biological Chemistry and Molecular Microbiology in conjunction with the Royal Society of Chemistry, and is also sponsored by five pharmaceutical and fine chemical companies, Organon, GlaxoSmithKline, Pfizer, AstraZeneca and Avecia.
Contact: Ian Eggleston 01382 344319
By Jane Smernicki, Press Officer 01382 344768 j.m.smernicki@dundee.ac.uk