Santuna Bhattacharya and Yamuna Krishnan-Ghosh found that N-lauroyl-L-alanine
selectively gelates aromatic and aliphatic hydrocarbons and other non-polar
organic solvents, suspended in water (Chem. Commun. 185 (2001)). In experiments,
where the gelator was solubilized either by heating or in ethanol, the
oil layer gelated completely by cooling to room temperature. A summary
in Chem. Eng. News, Jan.29, 2001,
page 12, suggest that this discovery may offer intriguing clean-up possibilities
for oil spills, such as caused two weeks ago by Jessica, the Ecuadorian
Tanker that spilled 200,000 gal of diesel oil in the Galapagos Islands.
Ben Feringa of Groningen University sees appllications in Reaction and
separation technology.