Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, a class of chemicals known as PFAS, are often called “forever chemicals” because of how long they persist in the environment. They are prevalent in drinking water and have been linked to negative health outcomes.

A slew of cleantech start-ups are cropping up with the aim of breaking down and destroying PFAS molecules. In this episode of C&EN Uncovered, reporter Britt Erickson explores the technologies behind these companies and the competition among them.

C&EN Uncovered, a project from C&EN’s podcast, Stereo Chemistry, offers a deeper look at subjects from recent stories. Check out Britt’s cover story on the destruction techniques for these “forever chemicals” at cenm.ag/foreverchemicals.

Cover photo: Argon gas plasma, which can break down PFAS, on the surface of liquid water

Subscribe to Stereo Chemistry now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

A transcript of this episode is available now at cen.acs.org.

Credits

Executive producer: Gina Vitale

C&EN Uncovered host: Craig Bettenhausen

Reporter: Britt Erickson

Audio editor: Ted Woods

Copyeditor: Bran Vickers

Story editor: Michael McCoy

Episode artwork: Courtesy of Selma Mededovic Thagard/Clarkson University

Music: “Hot Chocolate,” by Aves

Contact Stereo Chemistry: Contact us on social media at @cenmag or email cenfeedback@acs.org.

As the science of drug discovery has grown in scale and gotten more complicated, so have the drug molecules themselves. But there’s a promising class of drugs made of just a handful of atoms that punch above their weight by leveraging the natural chemistry of the cell.

Recent discoveries have opened up a new era of pharmaceutical chemistry that some people are calling a golden age. In this episode of C&EN Uncovered, reporter Laura Howes explains this exciting field of research and its implications for the drugs of the future.

C&EN Uncovered, a project from C&EN’s podcast, Stereo Chemistry, offers a deeper look at subjects from recent stories. Check out Laura’s cover story on small-molecule drugs at cenm.ag/smallmol.

Subscribe to Stereo Chemistry now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

A transcript of this episode is available at cenm.ag/smallmolpod.

Credits

Executive producer: Gina Vitale

C&EN Uncovered host: Craig Bettenhausen

Reporter: Laura Howes

Audio editor: Brian Gutierrez

Copyeditor: Bran Vickers

Story editor: Mitch Jacoby

Episode artwork: Chris Gash

Music: “Hot Chocolate,” by Aves

Contact Stereo Chemistry: Contact us on social media at @cenmag or email cenfeedback@acs.org.

Resting on the bottom of the ocean are potato-sized nodules of valuable minerals that are more or less up for grabs. Multiple corporations and some nations are racing to build deep-sea drones that can withstand the extreme conditions at the seafloor and bring these 1-20 cm nodules to eager buyers on the surface.

Many of the metals in these nodules are critical for green technologies like batteries. But these nodules are also an important part of ecosystems we are just beginning to understand. In this episode, C&EN reporter Priyanka Runwal chats with host Craig Bettenhausen about this complex issue.

C&EN Uncovered, a project from C&EN’s podcast, Stereo Chemistry, offers a deeper look at subjects from recent stories. Check out Runwal’s full story at cenm.ag/seafloormine.

For more about mining the oceans, check out this episode of Stereo Chemistry from earlier this year about filtering minerals directly out of the water: cenm.ag/ocean 

Subscribe to Stereo Chemistry now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. 

A transcript of this episode is available at cenm.ag/deapsea.

Credits

Executive producer: Gina Vitale

C&EN Uncovered host: Craig Bettenhausen

Reporter: Priyanka Runwal

Audio editor: Brian Gutierrez

Copyeditor: Bran Vickers

Story editor: Laura Howes

Episode artwork: Diva Amon/Craig Smith/University of Hawaii

Music: “Hot Chocolate,” by Aves

Contact Stereo Chemistry: Contact us on social media at @cenmag or email cenfeedback@acs.org.

The Nobel Prize announcements are big events at Chemical & Engineering News. But we find out the winners at the same time as everyone else. 

Then, the race is on for our reporters. 

This year, staffers Laurel Oldach and Mitch Jacoby took on the task of covering the science prizes. In this episode, they reflect on this year’s winning research in chemistry and medicine and share what it’s like covering the most prestigious prizes in science.

C&EN Uncovered, a project from C&EN’s podcast, Stereo Chemistry, offers a deeper look at subjects from recent stories. Check out our reporting on the 2023 Nobel Prizes at https://cen.acs.org/magazine/101/10133.html.

Subscribe to Stereo Chemistry now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. 

A transcript of this episode is available at cenm.ag/nobelpod23

Credits

Executive producer: Gina Vitale

Host: Gina Vitale

Reporters: Mitch Jacoby and Laura Oldach

Audio editor: Brian Gutierrez

Copyeditor: Bran Vickers

Story editor: Chris Gorski

Episode artwork: Milad Abolhasani/NCSU

Music: “Hot Chocolate,” by Aves

Contact Stereo Chemistry: Contact us on social media at @cenmag or email cenfeedback@acs.org.

The first issue of C&EN was published in 1923 with the stated purpose of “the promotion of research, the development of the chemical industry, and the welfare of the chemist.” 

The world of chemistry has grown a lot since then, and the magazine has been there to report on it all.

To celebrate our 100th anniversary, C&EN reporter and informal historian Alex Tullo has sifted through thousands of issues of the magazine, and in this episode, he guides our host Craig Bettenhausen on a tour through the magazine’s history from the industrialization of plastics, to the environmental movement, to the modern era of digital publication. 

When this episode was recorded, Tullo was preparing the From the Archives feature for the 1980s, which is now published.

C&EN Uncovered, a project from C&EN’s podcast, Stereo Chemistry, offers a deeper look at subjects from recent stories. Read Alex’s entire series about the C&EN archives at cenm.ag/fromthearchives.

A transcript of this episode can be found at http://cenm.ag/100yearspod.

Credits

Executive producer: Gina Vitale

C&EN Uncovered host: Craig Bettenhausen

Reporter: Alex Tullo

Audio editor: Brian Gutierrez

Copyeditor: Bran Vickers

Story editor: Manny I. Fox Morone

Episode artwork: Shutterstock/Kay Youn/Will Ludwig/C&EN

Music: “Hot Chocolate” by Aves

Contact Stereo Chemistry: Contact us on social media @cenmag or email cenfeedback@acs.org.

Early-career scientists are increasingly gravitating toward science policy, but the transition from the research bench to the policy office can be a tricky one. What can that path look like, and how can chemistry knowledge translate into a successful science policy career? In this bonus episode of C&EN’s Bonding Time, Mark Feuer DiTusa sits down with recent science PhD graduates and science policy professionals Jennifer DiStefano and Jared Mondschein to hear about their intertwined journeys, what science policy looks like for them, and how they think policy is shaping the direction of chemistry in the US.

You can find the episode where we spoke with six chemists about their yearlong science policy fellowships in Washington, DC, at http://cenm.ag/lessons.

You can connect with Jennifer DiStefano and Jared Mondschein at their LinkedIn pages.

A transcript of this episode can be found at http://cenm.ag/scipolicy

Credits

Executive producer: Gina Vitale

Writer: Mark Feuer DiTusa

Audio editor: Mark Feuer DiTusa, Brian Gutierrez

Story editor: Ariana Remmel

Copyeditor: Sabrina Ashwell, Michael McCoy

Show logo design: William A. Ludwig

Episode artwork: William A. Ludwig

Music (in order of appearance): “The Beat Detector” by Novembers, "Sugar Cubes" by Avner Kelmer

Contact Stereo Chemistry: Tweet at us at @cenmag or email cenfeedback@acs.org.

Hydrogen might be the key to a clean energy future, but only if it can be made without fossil fuels. Most hydrogen today is made from methane.

With generous government tax credits and enthusiasm for sustainable technology, the race is on for green hydrogen.

Craig Bettenhausen, our usual host, guides C&EN associate editor Gina Vitale through the hydrogen rainbow and how the periodic table’s number 1 element could become the number 1 fuel.

C&EN Uncovered, a new project from C&EN’s podcast, Stereo Chemistry, offers a deeper look at subjects from recent cover stories. Read Bettenhausen’s July 3, 2023, cover story about hydrogen electrolyzers at cenm.ag/hydrolyzers.

A transcript of this episode is available at cenm.ag/greenhydrogen.

Credits

Executive producer: Gina Vitale

Host: Gina Vitale

Cover story reporter: Craig Bettenhausen

Audio editor: Brian Gutierrez

Story editor: Michael McCoy

Copyeditor: Sabrina Ashwell

Show logo design: William A. Ludwig

Episode artwork: Nel

Music: “Hot Chocolate” by Aves

Contact Stereo Chemistry: Tweet at us @cenmag or email cenfeedback@acs.org.

The modern world runs on electronic devices and energy systems that are powered by valuable elements such as lithium and uranium. There are a limited number of terrestrial mines that produce energy-critical elements, which makes the supply of these materials prone to disruption. So researchers are looking to an unconventional source: seawater. Almost every element on the periodic table can be found in global oceans–but most are dissolved in ultralow concentrations. In this episode of Stereo Chemistry, we’ll hear from scientists in the United States and European Union about why they’re interested in extracting metals and minerals from seawater and how they’re using chemistry to do it.

A transcript of this episode will be available soon at cen.acs.org.

Download the Chemistry News by C&EN mobile app for iOS and Android. 

Learn more about lithium mining from our September 2022 episode.

Credits

Producers: Ariana Remmel, Kerri Jansen
Writer: Mitch Jacoby
Audio editor: Mark Feuer DiTusa
Story editors: Gina Vitale, Craig Bettenhausen
Copyeditor: Sabrina Ashwell
Show logo design: William A. Ludwig
Episode artwork: Shutterstock/C&EN Staff
Music (in order of appearance): “Daydream” by Ikoliks, “Distance” by Daniel Brown
Sound effects (in order of appearance): “Small waves, rocks and beach” from BigSoundBank.com

Contact Stereo Chemistry: Tweet at us @cenmag or email cenfeedback@acs.org.