selective copy-paste tl;dr to save you from clickbait:
Chemists have confirmed a 67-year-old theory about vitamin B1 by stabilizing a highly reactive molecule in water, a breakthrough that was long considered impossible. The molecule involved is a carbene, a form of carbon atom with only six valence electrons instead of the usual eight. This electron deficiency makes carbenes extremely unstable and reactive, especially in water, where they typically break down almost immediately. However, for decades, scientists have suspected that vitamin B1, or thiamine, might form a carbene-like intermediate during essential reactions in the body.
The reference is to Ronald Breslow, a Columbia University chemist who proposed in 1958 that vitamin B1 could convert into a carbene to drive biochemical transformations in the body. Breslow’s idea was compelling, but carbenes were so unstable, especially in water, that no one could prove they actually existed in a biological setting.
Lavallo’s team succeeded by wrapping the carbene in what he calls “a suit of armor,” a molecule they synthesized in the laboratory that shields the reactive center from water and other molecules. The resulting structure is stable enough to be studied with nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy and x-ray crystallography, providing conclusive evidence that carbenes like this can exist in water.
This discovery not only resolves a long-standing biochemical question but also paves the way for more sustainable and efficient methods of producing pharmaceuticals.
I love people like you, thanks
And I am sure that the funding for this type of research was recently cut by a certain meme agency.
Does this change anything in terms of healthy diets? And if it doesn’t, is it because this theory already being used in healthy diets? Or is it meaningless?
The article says that carbenes can be used to make chemical reactions less toxic, but they were too unstable to use until now.
Interesting. So it’s mostly about what those carbenes can be used rather than how it will change our understanding of B1?
Our new understanding of B1 is allowing us to use carbenes, yes. Also, they proved some old dude right.
Yeah for real thank you for tldr. This makes me wonder how many process we have cut out of our natural diet by accident. That’s a question for nutritionist I guess. where might their frontier of unknown lie?
