This week’s Reviews deal with the interactions of nanoparticles with the environment: H. F. Krug and P. Wick argue that nanotoxicology is an interdisciplinary challenge and a field of research in its own right. W. J. Stark discusses chances and challenges of the application of nanoparticles in medicine and industry. In a Minireview, F. Mende and O. Seitz present the solid-phase synthesis of alpha-peptide thioesters. In Highlights, E. Roulland discusses the planning of total syntheses without protecting groups and K. T. Holman analyses microporous molecular materials.
In the Communications section, H. Asanuma et al. describe oligomers of an artificial nucleic acid whose chirality and helicity can be tuned through the nucleic acid sequence (see picture). H. Schwarz et al. present heteronuclear vanadium phosphorus oxygen cluster ions and their reactivity towards hydrocarbons. S. D. Price et al. succeeded in the fast and efficient fluorination of small molecules by using SF42+.
