Research Network for Metals in Medicine

 

 

Associate Professor Lawrence Gahan

Position: Associate Professor, Chemistry

Affiliation: Molecular & Microbial Sciences School, University of Queensland

Postal Address:
Faculty of Biological and Chemical Sciences
The University of Queensland
Queensland, 4072
AUSTRALIA

Phone: +61 (07) 3365 3844
Fax: +61 (07) 3365 4273
Email: gahan@chemistry.uq.edu.au
Webpage: Associate Professor Gahan

Research Profile

Macrocyclic and macrobicyclic sulfur-nitrogen ligands: Our work has invariably involved ligand syntheses to prepare ligands containing variation in the juxtaposition of donor groups in order to attempt to tease out subtle electronic, structural and selectivity effects. Our contributions to the area include papers detailing the syntheses of encapsulated complexes of the sarcophagine type with donor sets other than N6, viz. N6-xSx (x = 0, 1, 2, 3), their syntheses, spectroscopy, structures, redox and electron transfer properties. A new class of ligands called amplectors has recently been prepared. These ligands offer the possibility of larger cavity size encapsulating ligands with considerable donor type variation.

Cyclic Peptides: We have studied the metal ion chemistry of macrocyclic peptide ligands, synthetic analogues of compounds found in sea squirts (ascidians). We have published a number of studies of these systems including some of the first studies which report quantitative measure of the binding constants of these systems with Ca(II) and Zn(II).

Chemical Sensors and Separation Science: We have developed equipment and methodologies to enable us to measure the kinetics of interaction of metal ions such as mercury(II), lead(II) and cadmium(II) with ligand receptor sites on the surface of a quartz crystal microbalance. The results of these investigations have the potential to be translated to the development of a large scale methodology for the separation and concentration of these potentially hazardous metal ions from waste streams.


Selected Publications

  1. Singh, Y., Sokolenko, N., Kelso, M. J., Abbenante, G., Fairlie, D. P. and Gahan, L. R. (2001) J. Amer. Chem. Soc., 2001, 123 (2), 333-334.
  2. Cusack, R. M., Abbanante, G., Grøndahl, L., Fairlie, D. P., Gahan, L. R., Hanson, G. R. and Hambley, T. W. (2000) J. Chem. Soc., Perkin Trans II, 323-331.
  3. Grillo,V. A., Gahan, L. R., Hanson, G. R., Hambley, T. W., Stranger, R., Moubaraki, B. and Murray, K. S. (1999) Aust. J. Chem., 52, 861- 866.