Physical chemistry
The latest chemistry news and research on physical chemistry, including quantum and theoretical, bonding, computational and surfaces and interfaces, from the Royal Society of Chemistry's magazine, Chemistry World
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ResearchNew evidence sheds light on mystery of ‘magic-angle’ graphene’s superconductivity
Best evidence yet points to unconventional superconductivity in twisted layer material
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ResearchParamagnetic NMR used to probe covalent character of halogen bonds
Assessing hyperfine shifts in paramagnetic NMR spectra provides new details on the covalent character of halogen bonded cocrystals
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ResearchAI-designed antibodies target antigens with atomic precision
Epitope-binding proteins designed from scratch by generative AI model
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ResearchInfrared and NMR fusion boosts automated structure verification
Study highlights untapped potential of IR spectroscopy data
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ResearchPhysicists hope to probe standard model with misshapen radium monofluoride
Effect never observed in a molecule could help adjudicate between competing models of nuclear structure
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ResearchUnmasking the hidden thermodynamic forces driving chemical reactions
Model links reaction energy to activation energy
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ResearchWater squeezed into 2D channels conducts electricity 100,000 times better
Network of quasi-2D hydrogen bonding may be responsible for effect
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NewsUK’s new national laboratories site will support ‘invisible infrastructure’ of measurements that keep world in sync
£20 million investment by LGC will boost country’s analytical and metrology capabilities
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ResearchQuantum tunnelling drives aromaticity flip-flop
Augmented pentalene structure could be a molecular Schrödinger’s cat, aromatic and antiaromatic at the same time
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WebinarWalter Kohn: from kindertransport and internment to DFT and the Nobel prize
Explore the legacy of Walter Kohn, the 1998 joint winner of the Nobel prize in chemistry – join us on 25 November
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NewsThe chemistry community should ban drawing chemical structures with generative AI, chemists warn
AIs like Microsoft’s Copilot, Google’s Gemini and OpenAI’s ChatGPT still make serious errors rendering structural formulae
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ResearchElectron transfer plays an underappreciated role in battery charging cycles
Ion transfer alone does not explain charging and discharging rates of lithium-ion batteries
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NewsThe 2025 Nobel prize in chemistry as it happens – live
Join us as we provide analysis and commentary in the run up to the announcement of the biggest prize in chemistry
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NewsMacroscopic quantum mechanical tunnelling wins Nobel prize in physics
John Clarke, Michel Devoret and John Martinis honoured for their observations of quantum effects in a superconducting electric circuit
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OpinionAI tools for chemistry aren’t the end, they are a means to a beginning
Is there life after death for the fields that fall to AI?
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OpinionKarl Mueller: ‘I realised I had matured when I started giving away my best ideas’
The director of Ames National Laboratory in the US discusses getting hooked on chemistry via parental inspiration and a benchtop NMR
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OpinionThe simple machine that visualised atomic orbitals
In 1931, Harvey Elliott White developed a device that traced out the shapes of electron clouds by approximating solutions to the Schrödinger equation
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ResearchElectron irradiation converts hydrocarbon crystals into nanodiamonds
Flawless nanodiamond synthesis that wasn’t thought possible accomplished by transforming adamantane
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ResearchFirst valence electron measurements capture fleeting reaction process
Femtosecond timescale x-ray laser measurements study how a hydrogen atom breaks off an ammonia molecule
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ResearchDiscovery of unusual iodine–silver bond opens up new possibilities for coordination chemistry
Crystallographic studies reveal that the bond is similar in length to typical metal–metal bonds