OBC is delighted to introduce our Editor’s Choice collection!
This collection showcases some of the best articles published in the journal, handpicked by our Associate Editors and Editorial Board members. This month we have a selection of recent OBC articles chosen by our Associate Editor Kate Jolliffe (University of Sydney). Take a look at which articles she chose and why.
Meet the Editor
Kate Jolliffe received her BSc (Hons) in 1993 and PhD in 1997 from the University of New South Wales. She then held positions at Twente University, University of Nottingham and the Australian National University before taking up an Australian Research Council QEII fellowship at The University of Sydney in 2002. In 2007 she became a Senior lecturer at the same institution and was promoted to Associate Professor in 2008 and to full Professor in 2009. She currently holds the position of Payne-Scott Professor at The University of Sydney.
Her research interests are in the areas of supramolecular, peptide and organic chemistry, with a focus on the design and synthesis of functional molecules, such as molecular sensors capable of detecting anions in biological environments or cyclic peptides for application in biology and medicine.
Kate’s favourite articles
Impact of charges on the hybridization kinetics and thermal stability of PNA duplexes
Miguel López-Tena & Nicolas Winssinger
Org. Biomol. Chem., 2024, 22, 5759-5767
“Peptide nucleic acids have a range of potential biomedical applications because they form duplexes with DNA and RNA that are more stable than DNA or RNA homoduplexes. López-Tena and Winssinger analyse how modifications of PNA structure at the γ-position impact hybridisation stability and kinetics, demonstrating that the higher stability of duplexes involving PNA results from slower dissociation kinetics rather than association kinetics (which are also slower relative to a DNA:DNA duplex). This improves our understanding of how to design molecular structures with specific function.”
Esteban Valencia & Pablo Ballester
Org. Biomol. Chem., 2024, 22, 5827-5834
“Mimicking nature’s molecular receptors and achieving similar selectivity and affinity is one of the key aims of supramolecular chemists. Valencia and Ballester use extended calix[4]pyrroles to bind biologically relevant methyl trialkylammonium cations with high affinity in water, providing a nice example of how synthetic molecules can be designed to mimic nature.”
Substituent effects of fluorinated bambusurils on their anion transport
Matúš Chvojka, Vladimír Šindelář & Hennie Valkenier
Org. Biomol. Chem., 2025, Advance Article
“In another example of supramolecular structure-activity analysis, Chovjka, Šindelář and Valkenier evaluate the anion transport properties of a small library of fluorinated bambusurils. Defining structure-activity relationships of these molecules is key to meeting the multiple criteria for effective ion transport in cells that will be required for application in treating chanellopathies e.g. cystic fibrosis. This paper demonstrates how small structural changes can have a large, and sometimes unanticipated, impact on function.”
We hope you enjoyed reading these articles. Keep an eye out for more of our Editors’ favourite articles in the future.
