Makoto Fujita

Date: 

Wednesday, June 3, 2015, 4:15pm to 5:15pm

Location: 

Pfizer Lecture Hall

Professor Makoto Fujita, University of Tokyo.  Crystalline Sponge Method Updated:  X-ray Structure Analysis without Crystallization on the Microgram Scale.  Special Seminar

Abstract: X-ray single crystal diffraction (SCD) analysis has the intrinsic limitation that the target molecules must be obtained as single crystals.  We recently reported a new protocol for SCD analysis that does not require the crystallization of the sample.  In our method, tiny crystals of porous complexes are soaked in the solution of a target, where the complexes can absorb the target molecules.  The crystallographic analysis clearly determines the absorbed guest structures along with the host frameworks.  As the SCD analysis is carried out with only one tiny crystal, the required sample amount is of the nano-to-microgram order.  With chiral guests, the space group of the crystal turned into chiral, enabling the determination of absolute configuration of the guests from the anomalous scattering from the host ZnI2 component.  When combined with high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC), multiple fractions were directly characterized, establishing a prototypical LC-SCD analysis.  Our recent results on the applications of the method for pharmaceutical studies will be also disclosed.