Text written in Basque and translated automatically by Elia without any subsequent editing. SEE ORIGINAL

"Without an appropriate scientific and technological base, a country cannot compete effectively"

Claudio Palomo (Barcelona, 1951), Professor of Organic Chemistry of the UPV has been awarded the Euskadi Prize for Research 2008 in the modality of Science and Technology. He received the prize in early February and two months later he received us calmly in the office.

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Kortabitarte Egiguren, Irati

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Partekatu

It is an honor and I felt a lot of joy. It is the result of an individual and team work, carried out by researchers who for many years have worked and work on the equipment they previewed. All these researchers have contributed to the development of organic chemistry in the Basque Country, placing it at the most prestigious levels. It is a stimulus to continue investigating, both for all researchers who are part of the research team and for those who in the future can join it.

I think it's a combination of both aspects. In other words, in general, the awards give a prize to work done previously, in this case of research on organic chemistry, but at the same time give strength and strength to continue with that work.

Great work. Research, like other knowledge activities, requires a continuous effort. The greatest reward of this effort is that the results of our own research have a great impact and that scientists value well. The prizes are, in part, the fruit of that constant effort of each of the researchers cited in his field. All together we have worked a lot in the faculty. We work especially in the field of organic chemistry.

(Photo: Photo gallery)

According to the textbooks, organic chemistry is the chemistry of carbon and its compounds. The basic components of life are, to a large extent, organic molecules: lipids, carbohydrates, proteins and nucleic acids. Organic chemistry is attractive above all because it explains how these compounds are formed in nature. In addition, nature allows to develop tools to build molecules with more appropriate characteristics that cannot be created with their own resources. Organic chemistry, in addition to observing the processes that take place in nature, can transform them and generate new processes and products. All this is very attractive. What's more, that's one of the things that differs from the rest of the basic sciences. If we look at the environment, we can observe that we owe chemistry a fundamental part of well-being.

Yes, my father, Antonio Luis, studied organic chemistry and three of his five brothers. All of them were founders of companies in the pharmaceutical sector and, in particular, founders of a Catalan company, together with others. Biochemie, a leading company in the production of beta-lactam antibiotics. Today, fortunately or unfortunately, it is part of the Novartis group. Surely that family situation led me to study Chemistry.

It is something to be done and they are doing, and well. Education, science, and technology should be the basis of all countries. Without these three milestones it is not possible to compete. That is, you cannot compete in a globalized world in constant growth. The construction of new emerging CIC in biosciences and nanotechnologies is cementing the progress of the ACBC. Perhaps it is my concern that the aid is destined mainly to this sector, forgetting the universities, in our case the UPV.

Undoubtedly, we must make a special effort in this field, but without losing sight of the university. The University is a knowledge generating institution. In addition, it is a training center for future professionals and researchers that every country needs. For this, adequate funding is necessary and, as is known, in general, the first institutions that suffer budget cuts are public research institutions. In any case, I hope that the Basque Government and the UPV will continue to subsidize research groups.

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The number of students may decline due to the current crisis, lack of motivation, constant changes in education, etc. The truth is that it is not easy to foresee the future. As I mentioned above, it is very important to train young researchers. They will be the ones that will replace the current researchers. I insist on this: without an appropriate scientific and technological base, a country cannot compete effectively. It is essential to promote scientific and technological studies (without forgetting the humanities). In addition, special attention should be paid to groups of researchers.

Unfortunately, chemistry has not always had the fame it should have. In fact, in the last two decades, the idea has been imposed, among other things, that chemistry is responsible for environmental pollution. In addition, during these years some small and medium enterprises have sunk, especially because they could not compete with the markets of China and India. On the contrary, chemistry is a creative science essential to increase the production of a country and improve the quality of life of its inhabitants.

Significant contributions in organic synthesis

The jury of the Euskadi Research Awards considers that Professor Palomo has made very important contributions in organic synthesis. These contributions have applications in different fields, especially in the production of compounds with biological properties.

Claudio Palomo's research team focuses on the study of organic synthesis and the control of the stereochemistry of organic reactions. "It is a basic and fundamental work. We could say that we are on the first level of building a building," explains Palomo. "Our job is to create carbon-carbon linkages in a stereocontrolled manner," he added.

(Photo: benjah-bmm 27)

For example, many drugs are chiral. When a molecule cannot be overcome with its mirror image, it is a mango. The most common quiral objects are the hands. Although both are very similar, they cannot overlap. Enantiomers are molecules that are mirrors between themselves -- of Greek origin, and enantios means the opposite. The quirality is one of the most representative characteristics of the organic molecules, and is fundamental to determine its characteristics and applications, since “an enantiomer can present certain characteristics and the other may not be, or rather, have very different characteristics. Therefore, alone and not mixed, we try to design or find tools for their training," explains Palomo.

For example, asparagine is a natural amino acid formed by two enantiomers. One of the two enantiomers has sweet flavor and the other bitter. These opposing characteristics are a consequence of the different spatial configurations of atoms occupied by enantiomers. There are more tragic examples. "Perhaps the most representative example of thalidomide is the importance of preparing a solo enantiomer. This drug was administered as an inseparable mixture of two enantiomers to pregnant women in the 1950s, in order to relieve the dizziness and nausea that this situation caused them. As a result of this drug, some children were born with congenital malformations that later learned that one of the two enantiomers was responsible for this phenomenon," explained Palomo, "we are developing a methodology to obtain a single enantiomer in a simple and practical way."