Spotlights

[Research News] Serendipitous Discovery Can Convert Toxic Nitric Oxide Into Nitrogen Gas!

Researchers reveal a new chemical reaction of nitric oxide and glycine to produce nitrogen gas at room temperature

Denitrification is essential to remove toxic nitric oxide from industrial emissions and polluted water. So far, the industrial process has involved high temperatures. Professor Kitagishi’s group accidentally stumbled upon a new chemical mechanism of denitrification at room temperature and in aqueous solution. They report hemoCD-I/P supramolecules that bind nitric oxide and release nitrogen when in acidic glycine-containing solution. This pioneering finding will aid industrial denitrification and accelerate efforts to protect the environment.

Reference
Atsuki Nakagami, Yoshihito Shiota, Kyosuke Fujikawa, Masahito Kodera, Hiroaki Kitagishi, N₂ Generation from Nitric Oxide Coordinated to Iron(III) Porphyrin in Acidic Glycine Buffer, Journal of the American Chemical Society, November 24, 2025
https://doi.org/10.1021/jacs.5c17871

https://research.doshisha.ac.jp/news/news-detail-84/

https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/1107858

Image 1

Image Title: Converting nitric oxide (NO) into gaseous nitrogen (N2)
Image Caption: (a) Formation of N2 bubbles in an aqueous solution containing hemoCD-I and NO in a glycine containing acidic buffer. (b) Gas chromatograms identifying molecular N2 in the NO-hemoCD-I complex solution.
Image Credit: Professor Hiroaki Kitagishi from Doshisha University, Japan
Image Source Link: https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/jacs.5c17871 
License type: CC-BY 4.0
Usage restriction: Credit must be given to the author.

Image 2

Image title: Chemistry behind N─N bond formation and denitrification on hemoCD 
Image caption: Schematic diagram shows possible chemical reaction resulting in nitrogen generation from nitric oxide bound to hemoCD-I in an acidic buffer with excess glycine.
Image credit: Professor Hiroaki Kitagishi from Doshisha University, Japan