RSC Advances Blog

Welcome to our Emerging Investigators Series 2022! This series, led by Prof Shirley Nakagaki (Federal University of Paraná, Brazil) and Dr Fabienne Dumoulin (Acıbadem Mehmet Ali Aydınlar Universit, Türkiye), highlights the very best work from early-career researchers in all areas of chemistry. 10 papers were published as part of the collection spanning the breadth of chemistry on topics ranging from green and environmental chemistry, to biological and bioinorganic chemistry, as well as papers that propose theoretical calculations as solutions to chemistry problems. You can read all about the contributions in this accompanying Editorial prepared by Shirley.

We would like to take this opportunity to highlight an author from the series, . We interviewed Ivaldo Itabaiana Junior to find out more about his area of research and his contribution to the series.

Lipase-catalyzed acylation of levoglucosan in continuous flow: antibacterial and biosurfactant studies
Marcelo A. do Nascimento, Juan P. C. Vargas, José G. A. Rodrigues, Raquel A. C. Leão, Patricia H. B. de Moura, Ivana C. R. Leal, Jonathan Bassut, Rodrigo O. M. A. de Souza, Robert Wojcieszake and Ivaldo Itabaiana, Jr
RSC Adv., 2022,12, 3027-3035

Professor Ivaldo Itabaiana Junior holds a degree in Pharmacy from the Federal University of Rio Janeiro (UFRJ), Brazil (2009), a PhD in Pharmaceutical Science from UFRJ (2013) with a sandwich period at the National Hellenic Research Foundation (Athens, Greece), as well as a post-doctorate in Biocatalysis from the Institute of Chemistry of UFRJ, and a Post-doctorate in hybrid catalysis from UCCS – CNRS (Lille, France).

Since 2014, he is an adjunct professor at the School of Chemistry of UFRJ, where he has been developing research on the application of the concepts of biocatalysis, biotransformation, photocatalysis and hybrid catalysis in the valorization of residual lignocellulosic biomass aiming at obtaining value-added compounds, such as enzymes, surfactants, polymers and building blocks, in order to obtain a zero-waste biorefinery. He has more than 58 published papers, and international collaborations, such as UCCS-Lille (France), UCL (Belgium), Universidad de Córdoba (Spain), EIE (Greece), and others. He has more than 12 graduate students, and is currently vice-coordinator of the Graduate Program in Chemical and Biochemical Process Engineering at UFRJ. In his career, he has won awards such as the best doctoral thesis at UFRJ (2014), as well as the Capes Thesis Award, at the national level. He also has projects funded by being a Young Scientist, and a research productivity fellow.

Could you briefly explain the focus of your article to the non-specialist (in one or two sentences only) and why it is of current interest?

This article aimed to obtain a compound with antibacterial and surfactant properties from a precursor derived from agro-industrial waste, as a form of reuse, aiming at an environmentally friendly process.

How big an impact could your results potentially have?

This work can generate an industrial product that presents great biosurfactant and antibacterial capacity, produced under mild conditions of reaction, since it comes from an enzymatic way and presents as substrate the levoglucosan, originated from residual biomass pyrolysis. Therefore, our results move towards a possible construction of an integrated process of valorisation of lignocellulosic biomass, with probability of low cost steps.

Could you explain the motivation behind this study?

My research currently involves the valorization of Brazilian and worldwide residual biomass, aiming to obtain molecules that contribute to the society in general, in order to contribute to the improvement of the quality of life. The lignocellulosic residues, as a reflection of the increase in life expectancy of the world population and the consequent industrialization, have increased alarmingly, and new processes to add these components back into the productive chain are required. Our group has work in this challenging area, where this article is part of a project of valorisation of levoglucosan, a compound that has origin in the fast pyrolysis of these biomasses.

In your opinion, what are the key design considerations for your study?

Levoglucosan (LG) is a challenging molecule since it is obtained through pyrolysis of residual lignocellulosic biomass. Our group has been studying better conditions to obtain LG through fast pyrolysis of several biomasses. As it is a complex mixture of compounds, pyrolysis products also challenge us to develop new technologies for the best use of these fractions, and with this, my line of research has been based on the coupling of biocatalysis, photocatalysis, and hybrid catalysis in obtaining new compounds that can add value and return the residual biomass to the production chain, as a way of establishing future zero biorefineries.
LG chemically challenges us in obtaining compounds of industrial importance, since it presents a structure with steric hindrance, and there are still few published works where this molecule is applied as a substrate or starting reagent for obtaining derived compounds. Therefore, we seek to fill a gap in the literature, and we hope to succeed.

Which part of the work towards this paper proved to be most challenging?

In my opinion, the characterization of the esterification reaction products were the most challenging, since levoglucosan presents a differentiated stereochemistry, generating the possibility of formation of more than one product. Thus, some previous steps of separation and characterization with different physical methods were necessary to evaluate and quantify the products formed. Moreover, the biomass pyrolysis and optimization step to obtain larger amounts of levoglucosan also deserves attention due to the complexity of lignocellulosic materials.

What aspect of your work are you most excited about at the moment?

At this point in our research, we were able to couple important results on photocatalysis and biocatalysis in the construction of new catalysts that managed to improve the reaction selectivity of LG with other compounds, in order to obtain new molecules with biosurfactant potential. We are advancing in this part and managing to build new catalytic systems for the valorization of other molecules from residual biomass.
We are also investing in collaborations for process modeling and building robust models for the prediction of better catalytic conditions, which are more economically viable and sustainable, and we are obtaining encouraging results.

How has your research evolved from your first article to this particular article?

My first paper in my scientific career was published demonstrating the phytochemical study of medicinal plants with antimicrobial properties. Currently, we seek, through the valorization of lignocellulosic biomass, to obtain new molecules that also have this application. It is interesting to carry out this relationship, where I could realize that over time, I could follow the evolution of science and technology, and couple the knowledge acquired in my work, without escaping my main objectives, which are to find molecules that can improve the quality of life of the world population.

What is the next step? What work is planned?

Some molecules derived from lignocellulosic biomass showed potential biological activity, and in this sense, the next steps will be to improve yields and selectivity in obtaining these compounds, increase the scale of production and perform new more specific assays to determine mechanism of action and new models of activity. We hope to continue publishing new processes, technologies and integrated results of synthesis and application.

Why did you want to publish in RSC Advances?

The publication of the article in RSC Advances came from a prior invitation from the editor, which we were very happy about. The journal has a relevant impact in the area of biocatalysis and biotechnology, with very inspiring works. Our group already has previous works in this journal, the impact was very positive.

What are your thoughts on open access publishing?

In my opinion Open Access publishing should be a standard within the academic world. The dissemination of knowledge is a fundamental pillar for science, which is the one that produces knowledge. Unfortunately, the capitalist world still imposes many barriers for scientists to know the work of other colleagues, or to carry out more grandiose research, which could improve the quality of life of the world population. And it all starts with greater access to information.

Submit to RSC Advances today! Check out our author guidelines for information on our article types or find out more about the advantages of publishing in a Royal Society of Chemistry journal.

Keep up to date with our latest  Popular Advances articles, Reviews, Collections & more by following us on Twitter. You can also keep informed by signing up to our E-Alerts.

Welcome to our Emerging Investigators Series 2022! This series, led by Prof Shirley Nakagaki (Federal University of Paraná, Brazil) and Dr Fabienne Dumoulin (Acıbadem Mehmet Ali Aydınlar Universit, Türkiye), highlights the very best work from early-career researchers in all areas of chemistry. 10 papers were published as part of the collection spanning the breadth of chemistry on topics ranging from green and environmental chemistry, to biological and bioinorganic chemistry, as well as papers that propose theoretical calculations as solutions to chemistry problems. You can read all about the contributions in this accompanying Editorial prepared by Shirley.

We would like to take this opportunity to highlight an author from the series, Prof Dr Noémie Elgrishi. We interviewed Noémie to find out more about her area of research and her contribution to the series.

Impact of the choice of buffer on the electrochemical reduction of Cr(vi) in water on carbon electrodes
Callie M. Stern, Devin D. Meche and Noémie Elgrishi
RSC Adv., 2022,12, 32592-32599

Noémie Elgrishi is an assistant professor at Louisiana State University. A native of France, Noémie worked in the labs of Jonathan Nitschke (University of Cambridge) and Daniel Nocera (MIT, now Harvard University) during her Master’s degree (Sorbonne University, formerly University Pierre and Marie Curie – Paris 6). After obtaining a PhD from Sorbonne University working with Marc Fontecave (Collège de France), during which she was named a 2012 Scifinder Future Leader, she was a Postdoctoral Researcher under the mentorship of Jillian Dempsey (UNC-Chapel Hill) for 2 years. Since starting at LSU in 2017, Noémie’s group has developed a fundamental-science-first approach to interrogate environmentally relevant problems. Research centers on the intersection of electrochemistry and supramolecular chemistry to answer key questions related to water and energy challenges. Noémie Elgrishi received a CAREER award from the National Science Foundation in 2021 and will be an editorial broad member for the Journal of Coordination Chemistry starting in 2023.

Could you briefly explain the focus of your article to the non-specialist (in one or two sentences only) and why it is of current interest?

Electrochemical methods are well-suited to reduce toxic hexavalent chromium to purify drinking water, but the challenge is mitigating the energetic cost associated with the transfer of the large number of protons and electrons required all while using cheap carbon electrodes. Here we show how the choice of buffer, not simply the pH, influences the reaction and we also demonstrate a very simple way to recycle electrodes if they get fouled during use.

How big an impact could your results potentially have?

The work helps establish that in the conditions studied: 1) cheap carbon electrodes can be used instead of noble metals, 2) Cr(VI) reduction is gated by a similar proton-coupled electron transfer step in multiple buffers, 3) some buffers promote adsorption of the resulting Cr(III) on the electrode, and 4) it is possible to restore the electrode surface and regain activity with a simple rinse, without the need for re-polishing. Combined, these open the way to the development of water purification flow systems to reduce Cr(VI) in water.

Could you explain the motivation behind this study?

The motivation is to advance electrochemical water purification, specifically targeting toxic hexavalent chromium, by leveraging knowledge from the community working on Proton-Coupled Electron Transfers. At its core, the challenge of Cr(VI) reduction is the efficient transfer of multiple protons and electrons. This is thermodynamically easy but kinetically challenging. Before developing catalysts to mediate the transformation, it was important to identify the parameters influencing direct electroreduction of Cr(VI) at an electrode.

In your opinion, what are the key design considerations for your study?

Realizing that buffers are not inert innocent spectators! We are so used to thinking of buffers in water as a means to work at a fixed pH, without really considering the effect of the specific acid/bases added.

Which part of the work towards this paper proved to be most challenging?

Experimentally, the observation of Cr(III) plating on the electrode in certain conditions significantly increased the time required for data collection as freshly polished electrodes were required for every single scan. Scientifically, realizing that the buffer was the cause of these changes in behavior was the most challenging.

What aspect of your work are you most excited about at the moment?

I am excited about our progress on developing electrocatalysts to further mediate the Cr(VI) reduction transformation, as well as applying lessons learned to other problematic oxyanions contaminating water supplies.

How has your research evolved from your first article to this particular article?

Our fist paper on this project demonstrated that carbon electrodes are effective for the reduction of Cr(VI) in water across a wide range of pH. We were using a citrate buffer for that work as we were covering a large pH range. In this new paper we explore how that seemingly innocuous choice of buffer actually impacts many steps of the Cr(VI) reduction process.

What is the next step? What work is planned?

We would like to develop electrocatalysts to speed up the reaction and, critically, decrease the energy required (lowering the overpotential). We have made progress in that direction and hope to be able to share more soon.

Why did you want to publish in RSC Advances?

I value the RSC as a non-profit scientific society. I also love the ease of submitting papers to the RSC when using the template, with auto-populating fields which speeds up the submission process. I chose RSC Advances specifically as it is a general journal with a broad audience.

What are your thoughts on open access publishing?

It is fantastic to hear that the RSC, and others, are moving to open access. I just hope funding follows, since the current model is to let the researcher somehow cover the costs. This could create a model where only the top funded groups are even able to consider publishing in the top journals (given the large cost), and where decisions on which journal to consider to submit a paper are based on the cost first instead, of journal audience or fit.

Submit to RSC Advances today! Check out our author guidelines for information on our article types or find out more about the advantages of publishing in a Royal Society of Chemistry journal.

Keep up to date with our latest  Popular Advances articles, Reviews, Collections & more by following us on Twitter. You can also keep informed by signing up to our E-Alerts.

Welcome to our Emerging Investigators Series 2022! This series, led by Prof Shirley Nakagaki (Federal University of Paraná, Brazil) and Dr Fabienne Dumoulin (Acıbadem Mehmet Ali Aydınlar Universit, Türkiye), highlights the very best work from early-career researchers in all areas of chemistry. 10 papers were published as part of the collection spanning the breadth of chemistry on topics ranging from green and environmental chemistry, to biological and bioinorganic chemistry, as well as papers that propose theoretical calculations as solutions to chemistry problems. You can read all about the contributions in this accompanying Editorial prepared by Shirley.

We would like to take this opportunity to highlight an author from the series, Dr Kelly M. Schultz. We interviewed Kelly to find out more about her area of research and her contribution to the series.

Gelation phase diagrams of colloidal rod systems measured over a large composition space
Shiqin He, Marco Caggioni, Seth Lindberg and Kelly M. Schultz
RSC Adv., 2022,12, 12902-12912

Dr. Kelly M. Schultz is an Associate Professor in the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at Lehigh University. She obtained her B.S. in Chemical Engineering from Northeastern University in 2006 and a Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering with Professor Eric Furst from the University of Delaware in 2011 as a National Science Foundation graduate research fellow. While at Delaware, she was invited to speak in the American Chemical Society Excellence in Graduate Polymers Research Symposium and was selected as the Fraser and Shirley Russell Teaching Fellow. Following her PhD, she was a Howard Hughes Medical Institute postdoctoral research associate at the University of Colorado at Boulder working in the laboratory of Professor Kristi Anseth. As a postdoc, she was invited to participate in the Distinguished Young Scholars Summer Seminar Series at the University of Washington. She began her position as Assistant Professor at Lehigh University in 2013, was named a P.C. Rossin Assistant Professor from 2016 – 2018 and was promoted to Associate Professor in 2019. Dr. Schultz was named one of TA Instruments Distinguished Young Rheologists (2014), awarded a NSF CAREER award (2018), the Lehigh University Libsch Early Career Research Award (2019), the P.C. Rossin College of Engineering and Applied Science Excellence in Research Scholarship & Leadership (2020), a National Institutes of Health – National Institute of General Medical Sciences Maximizing Investigators’ Research Award (MIRA R35, 2022) and named the Pirkey Centennial Lecturer by the McKetta Department of Chemical Engineering at the University of Texas at Austin (2022). Dr. Schultz and her research group study emerging gel materials developed for applications from consumer products to materials that can enhance and restart wound healing. Of particular interest is the development of bulk and microrheological techniques that measure how 3D encapsulated human mesenchymal stem cells degrade and remodel synthetic hydrogel scaffolds during motility.

Could you briefly explain the focus of your article to the non-specialist (in one or two sentences only) and why it is of current interest?

This work focuses on characterizing the material properties of different formulations of a colloidal fibrous gel. These materials are used in fabric and home care products and this work provides a table where the desired material properties can be looked up eliminating trial-and-error experiments during product development.

How big an impact could your results potentially have?

This work is in collaboration with engineers at Procter & Gamble. We are working with some of their materials but also exploring new materials with similar dimensions that they are interested in using in consumer products. So there is potential for our work to inform the design of new products. To the greater scientific community, this work provides a methodology for tackling material characterization over a large formulation space, which can also have an impact.

Could you explain the motivation behind this study?

As I mentioned in the previous question, this has been a long standing collaboration with Procter & Gamble. We started working with colloidal fibers that they currently use in their fabric and home care products. Since then we have expanded the work to investigate different Fibers to determine if they can also be used as rheological modifiers. Beyond enabling the use of these materials in new products, my group is interested in developing new characterization and analysis techniques. This work uses established characterization techniques to collect data but as you can see in the presentation of the data, we aim to maximize the information we can get from a measurement and that is always a motivation behind our work.

In your opinion, what are the key design considerations for your study?

The key design consideration for our study was to systematically traverse a large formulation space experimentally. Then we wanted to find a way to present this large set of data that would enable a researcher that is working in formulations to use this as a lookup table to inform the design of their product.

Which part of the work towards this paper proved to be most challenging?

The interpretation and presentation of the data was quite challenging. We had a large amount of data and at some point you realize that the more data you have the harder it is to interpret it. Being able to organize it in a way that we could show trends and draw conclusions was really a challenge.

What aspect of your work are you most excited about at the moment?

This work is evolving to use more sustainable colloidal fibers, something both my group and our collaborators are interested in. This is really exciting since it has the potential to use a waste product in new formulations.

How has your research evolved from your first article to this particular article?

Our first article on this work was developed analysis methods to interpret microrheological data to characterize a heterogeneous colloidal gel. All of the work since that time has built upon this to give us a toolbox of characterization and analysis techniques that allows us to effectively interpret our data, even in complex systems. We have also started characterizing new colloidal gel systems, which are very exciting. Using these techniques and previous knowledge to characterize the rheology of these materials, we hope to enable their use in products.

What is the next step? What work is planned?

As mentioned previously, we are moving on to a sustainable colloid, a waste product. We are characterizing this material to see if we can modify the colloid to enable it’s use as a rheological modifier in fabric and home care products. We are really excited about this work and the direction that the project is taking.

Why did you want to publish in RSC Advances?

We thought that this was not only an interesting study of these particular materials but also a really nice way to characterize, analyze and present this type of data. The reason we chose RSC Advances was because of the wide readership. We thought getting not only the results but the technique to a wider audience would have a bigger impact.

Submit to RSC Advances today! Check out our author guidelines for information on our article types or find out more about the advantages of publishing in a Royal Society of Chemistry journal.

Keep up to date with our latest  Popular Advances articles, Reviews, Collections & more by following us on Twitter. You can also keep informed by signing up to our E-Alerts.

Welcome to our Emerging Investigators Series 2022! This series, led by Prof Shirley Nakagaki (Federal University of Paraná, Brazil) and Dr Fabienne Dumoulin (Acıbadem Mehmet Ali Aydınlar Universit, Türkiye), highlights the very best work from early-career researchers in all areas of chemistry. 10 papers were published as part of the collection spanning the breadth of chemistry on topics ranging from green and environmental chemistry, to biological and bioinorganic chemistry, as well as papers that propose theoretical calculations as solutions to chemistry problems. You can read all about the contributions in this accompanying Editorial prepared by Shirley.

We would like to take this opportunity to highlight an author from the series, Prof Dr Julio Cezar Pastre. We interviewed Julio to find out more about his area of research and his contribution to the series.

Continuous flow Meerwein–Ponndorf–Verley reduction of HMF and furfural using basic zirconium carbonate
Henrique Magri Marçon and Julio Cezar Pastre
RSC Adv., 2022,12, 7980-7989

Julio C. Pastre obtained his PhD in 2009 under the guidance of Professor Carlos Roque D. Correia at the University of Campinas – UNICAMP. He then worked as a research scientist at Rhodia-Solvay before moving back to UNICAMP for postdoctoral studies with Professor Ronaldo A. Pilli. In 2012, he joined the group of Professor Steven V. Ley at the University of Cambridge. Two years later, Julio established his independent research group at UNICAMP and recently became an Associate Professor. In 2019, he was recognized as an ‘Emerging Investigator’ by Reaction Chemistry & Engineering and as a ‘New Talent from the Americas’ by RSC Medicinal Chemistry. Julio was chosen by the editorial boards of Synthesis, Synlett, and Synfacts as one of their ‘Thieme Chemistry Journals Awardees’ for 2023. His research interest focuses on the development of new synthetic methods in batch under microwave irradiation and under continuous flow conditions for the synthesis of platform molecules, new chemicals and APIs.

Could you briefly explain the focus of your article to the non-specialist and why it is of current interest?

In this work, we explored the valorization of two biobased chemicals (HMF and furfural) that can, for example, be used in the synthesis of polymers and are important intermediates to reduce our fossil-dependency and mitigate environmental issues.

How big an impact could your results potentially have?

By designing new synthetic methods that take full advantage of the capabilities of new enabling technologies, one will inevitably end up with greener, cleaner processes.

Could you explain the motivation behind this study?

We are keen to develop new processes for the synthesis of high value-added compounds from biomass derivatives in continuous flow regime.

In your opinion, what are the key design considerations for your study?

Our group has already identified continuous flow processing as a fundamental technology for the valorization of biomass derivatives, so that any designed methods can be rapidly scaled to manufacture. Moreover, many of the principles of Green Chemistry can be met by embracing new technologies that are inherently cleaner when compared to the traditional approaches.

Which part of the work towards this paper proved to be most challenging?

Although the process concerns just a reduction of an aldehyde, the obtention of a selective process is quite challenging since several competitive reactions can take place leading, for example, to the formation of humins.

What aspect of your work are you most excited about at the moment?

We are excited about the impact that flow chemistry can have in the valorization of biomass considering its key advantages, such as better control of heat and mass transfer, improved mixing, and safety profile.

How has your research evolved from your first article to this particular article?

Most of our previous works were done under homogeneous conditions. The use of heterogeneous catalysts in a fixed-bed reactor represents a good evolution in view of catalyst recycling, product separation and throughput.

What is the next step? What work is planned?

We want to apply these findings to other biobased chemicals and develop an integrated approach for the valorization of these materials.

Why did you want to publish in RSC Advances?

I’m a reader of RSC Advances, which publishes high impact research. So, it is a great pleasure to have our work published in such a prestigious journal.

What are your thoughts on open access publishing?

I believe open access publishing is going to be dominant soon since it gives access to a broader community and “democratize” science.

Submit to RSC Advances today! Check out our author guidelines for information on our article types or find out more about the advantages of publishing in a Royal Society of Chemistry journal.

Keep up to date with our latest  Popular Advances articles, Reviews, Collections & more by following us on Twitter. You can also keep informed by signing up to our E-Alerts.