Heat, not light could shine the way for drug development, suggests study
9 Nov 2025
Drugs manufacture might be made speedier and cheaper if makers opted for heat technology in favour of more complex methods, suggests new research from the University of Manchester.
Much of the chemical reactions that underpin today’s output require either light or electricity sources –photochemical or electrochemical technologies – to drive the electron transfer reaction that shifts electrons between molecules to create products.
The drawback is that these processes present a challenge when scaling up from lab conditions to industrial production. Cost is also an issue because of the reliance upon specialist infrastructure and reactors.
At the University of Manchester, scientists set themselves the goal of developing an accessible and cheaper approach to prompting electron transfer reactions for industrial use and by using simpler technology.
They reported that they triggered electron transfer reactions by heating together two common, cheaper chemicals consisting of azo compound and a formate salt in a standard industrial reactor.
The reagents naturally form a highly reactive ‘carbon dioxide radical anion’ molecule capable of driving a variety of chemical transformations.
Lead researcher, lecturer in synthetic organic chemistry at The University of Manchester, Dr Michael James, said: “By using something as simple as heat - something every chemistry lab already has - we’ve created a process that can be scaled more easily and used by companies without the need for expensive, specialised equipment, opening up new possibilities for chemists all over the world.”
With the help of biopharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca’s director of global high-throughput Dr James Douglas from AstraZeneca, the researchers reported in Nature, they were able to test the method’s scalability and its application for a range of chemical reactions employed in drug discovery.
Lecturer in computational & theoretical chemistry at Manchester, Dr Cristina Trujillo, said the work would have a value both for industrial and research purposes.
“Radical chain chemistry underpins so many areas of science and manufacturing, so we hope this simple initiation method will be of wide use across both industry and academia,” she explained.
“Beyond large-scale applications, it could also become a valuable tool for researchers studying new chemical reactions.”
Pic: Large reactor (Dr Michael James, University of Manchester).
