“Gerhard Herzberg” gold medal, Canada’s equivalent to the Nobel prize, which, similar to most of the Canadians equivalents, is only known to Canadians themselves!” was awarded to Professor “David Dolphin”, from UBC, for his amazing research on the unique properties of Porphyrin, a highly colored, donut-shaped chemical with a metallic part in the middle among which, Heme (part of blood’s hemoglobin which is red and has Iron in the middle) and Chlorophyll (which is green and has magnesium in the middle) are two known examples.
What Professor Dolphin discovered was, if the central metallic part is removed from the Porphyrin, it can absorb light and transfer it to a molecule of oxygen and for a very brief period of time, change a normal non-toxic molecule of oxygen to a highly-toxic one, which can be used to destroy unwanted tissues, like tumors. The magical thing is, as soon as the light goes off, the toxicity disappears within 2 milliseconds. A drug which has been made based on this exceptional chemicals, not only can destroy tumor cells, but also the blood vessels who are responsible for feeding the tumor thus it’s much more effective than most of the drugs which are presently being used against cancer.
I found it quite amazing and I just wanted to share this with you.
P.S. The Herzberg's gold medal is being awarded each year by “NSERC”, alongside with one million dollars of research funding.
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