For the first time, chemists in the University of Minnesota Twin Cities College of Science and Engineering have created a highly reactive chemical compound that has eluded scientists for more than 120 ...

Everything we can see and touch, and quite a lot that we can’t as well, is made of tiny particles called atoms. Some substances, like particles of this iron, contain only one kind of atom. Iron is an ...

A chemical compound is a chemical substance composed of many identical molecules (or molecular entities) composed of atoms from more than one element held together by chemical bonds. A molecule ...

Ammonia rarely makes headlines, but much of modern life depends on it. The compound of nitrogen and hydrogen is the key ingredient in the fertilizers that help feed roughly half of the world's ...

Mass spectrometers are high-tech machines that play an important role in our society. They are highly sensitive analytical instruments that are indispensable in areas such as medical diagnostics, food ...

Nature Chemical Biology is committed to enhancing interdisciplinary communication and features online content to increase the accessibility of chemical information for our readers. The adage that “a ...

Researchers who manipulate lignin, a molecular fiber that allows plants to grow tall and transport water, unexpectedly discovered its synthesis has more far-reaching effects on plant development than ...

What’s out there? It’s a question humans have been asking for as long as there have been humans. Our ancestors struck out across continents and oceans to make the unknown known. Now, we’re using ...

Scientists don’t know the limits of chemical space—the collection of all possible molecules—but a new analysis concludes chemists have discovered new compounds in that space at an exponential rate ...

Helium, a noble gas, was long believed to be 'too aloof' to react with the other elements on the periodic table. Now, however, scientists have provided a theoretical explanation of how helium may be ...

Helium, the most noble of the noble gases, long thought to be completely inert and thus too standoffish to bond with other atoms, recently surprised chemists by forming chemical compounds after all.