Chemists synthesize ocean-based molecule that could fight Parkinson's

Recreating natural molecules in the laboratory as part of the search for potential new drugs for disease can be difficult, costly and slow. The problem? Many chemical processes tend to produce not only a version of the molecule found in nature but also a mirror-image version of the molecule that is potentially useless -- or even dangerous. In synthesizing a new, potentially therapeutic molecule found in a sea sponge, chemists used a reactive compound that helps them create only the desired version of the molecule, making synthesis more efficient and less costly.