THE search for the answer to a centuries-old chemistry problem has revealed a new group of molecules that promise to enhance magnetic resonance images.
Tianbo Liu and his team at Brookhaven National Laboratory in New York State were trying to work out the complex structure of molecules in a brightly coloured solution called molybdenum blue. It’s a question that has stumped chemists for more than 200 years.
He started by shining laser light through the solution to see how much of it was scattered. The more the light is scattered, the larger the dissolved molecules must be.
From this he…
