Biomimetic and Polymeric Catalysis in Water

This award by the Chemical Structure, Dynamics and Mechanisms Program of the Chemistry Division supports the efforts of Professor Ronald Breslow of Columbia University to study catalysis within the interiors of macromolecules. There are many advantages to these enzyme mimics, including the ability to organize well-defined three-dimensional structures around the reacting species. Professor Breslow and his group prepare polymers containing imidazole sidechains that are even more effective than the best previously-studied polyamines. The group also studies new polymers, including some with very highly defined sizes and shapes. These new polymers are used as mimics for biological reactions that use thiamine pyrophosphate as a coenzyme in processes that are central to life. The catalysts are used for cleaving RNA.

In a second project, Professor Breslow and his group develops evidence about how amino acids, nucleosides, and sugars form on prebiotic earth. This work addressed the formation of chiral structures, one of the great unsolved mysteries in science. A major goal of modern chemistry is to be able to predict the properties of unknown compounds reliably. Professor Breslow's research group and collaborators from Columbia University's Chemistry Department develop computational methods to quantitatively predict the extent to which reactions that establish handedness perform. Their methods predict unknown chemistries that could lead to useful synthetic processes for manufacturing medicinal compounds.

This research program show how reactions perform in water taking advantage of hydrophobic binding while avoiding the problems that water can cause when it binds to catalytic groups and substrates. The artificial enzyme systems expand the field of chemistry to include processes in which multiple components are spontaneously bound to a catalyst, as happens with natural enzymes. Water is an environmentally benign solvent and is of great interest as a component of Green Chemistry.