Mechanical-based systems, natural

Another important area is the use of photochemistry—chemistry that results from light absorption—to perform transformations that are not otherwise possible. The practical applications of photosynthesis were based on fundamental work to learn the new pathways that light absorption makes possible, but the work on these synthetic methods has also added to our basic understanding of the reaction mechanisms. The important natural process of photosynthesis also inspires some work in photochemistry, where the challenge is one of producing artificial photosynthetic systems that could use sunlight to drive the formation of energetic materials. 

Impressive, highly ordered centimetre-sized fibres are obtained whose synergistic growth mechanism based on the kinetic cross-coupling of a dynamical supramolecular self-assembly and a stabilizing silica mineralization may well be the basis of the synthetic paths used by Nature to obtain its materials with well-defined multiscale architectures in biological systems. 

The use of hairy roots for the production of biopharmaceuticals has been studied extensively and has been discussed in Chapter 1 of this book. To date, over 116 different plant species have been induced to produce hairy roots in culture (Guillon, 2006). Originally, an expression system was developed for protein production based on the natural secretion from roots of intact plants. In order to take up nutrients from the soil, interact with other soil organisms, and defend themselves against numerous pathogens, plant roots have developed sophisticated mechanisms based upon... 

It may be noted that all of the homosteric catalysts were chiral zinc systems, the composition of which was expressed as [RZnOR ]x[R,OZnOR,]J,(v/y < 1). Antisteric catalysts were chiral zinc- or cadmium-based systems of a common compositional feature expressed as [RZnOR ]x[R OZnOR ]>, or [RCdOR ]x [R OCdOR ]) (x/y > 2). The nature of homosteric and antisteric stereoelection has not yet been elucidated fully at the molecular level because the structure of the operating species and the polymerisation mechanism with these catalysts are not clearly established [52]. 

---