Changes in the Solubility of β-Cyclodextrin on Complex Formation: Guest Enforced Solubility of β-Cyclodextrin Inclusion Complexes

The most common native host molecule, -cyclodextrin (cycloheptaamylose) is able toform inclusion complexes with a large variety of guestmolecules (or ions) of different size and shape. Theproperties of the included guest molecule are highlyinfluenced by the host-guest interaction, and thepractical usefulness of -cyclodextrin isdependent on these effects. These changes are mainlyinvestigated from the point of view of the guest andto a lesser extent from that of the host. In spite ofthis, the kind of guests and that of the host-guestinteractions during the formation of the inclusioncomplex seem to influence the properties of thehydrophilic domain of -cyclodextrin (i.e. thatof the supramolecule itself), too, and this effect canbe well demonstrated by the change of solubility ofdifferent -cyclodextrin inclusion complexes.This change can be best correlated with the solubilityof the guest as if the guest enforced its solubilityon the supramolecule.     

Separation of Fumonisins by OPLC

JPC – Journal of Planar Chromatography – Modern TLC - Fumonisins were produced by six strains of Fusarium moniliforme and Fusarium proliferatum on inoculated rice culture. For study of...     

Isotropic umbrella based triangulation of regular parametric surfaces

In this paper we propose an advancing front method for generating an isotropic triangular mesh on a regular parametric surface. Starting from a point on the surface, the method computes a set of points in the intersection curve between the surface and the sphere centered at that point with a prescribed radius. From this set we select the vertices of a cell composed by triangles approximately equilateral. The mesh grows repeating the described computation with boundary vertices of the cell as starting points. Compared to methods proposed by other authors, the current method may be considered as an improvement, since it is more efficient and flexible. Furthermore, the resulting mesh is closer to being isotropic. Additionally, we obtain a sufficient condition ensuring that a surface triangulation is of Delaunay type.     

Relative acidities and structure analysis of cis and trans isomers of 1,5‐oxazaspiro[5.5] undecane derivatives by multinuclear magnetic resonance

The relative acidities of the cis and trans isomers of a series of 1,5‐oxazaspiro[5.5]undecane derivatives were determined by measuring ΔpK in acid‐base titrations followed by ¹ H NMR. Relative structural stabilities were determined by measuring substituent chemical shift and γ‐gauche effects in ¹³C, ¹⁵N, and ¹⁷O NMR. Crystallographic characterization of a model spiro[5.5]undecane is presented to support the basicity in solid state. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Resolution and uniqueness of estimated parameters of a model of thin filament regulation in solution

The estimation of chemical kinetic rate constants for any non-trivial model is complex due to the nonlinear effects of second order chemical reactions. We developed an algorithm to accomplish this goal based on the Damped Least Squares (DLS) inversion method and then tested the effectiveness of this method on the McKillop–Geeves (MG) model of thin filament regulation. The kinetics of MG model is defined by a set of nonlinear ordinary differential equations (ODEs) that predict the evolution of troponin–tropomyosin–actin and actin–myosin states. The values of the rate constants are estimated by integrating these ODEs numerically and fitting them to a series of stopped-flow pyrene fluorescence transients of myosin-S1 fragment binding to regulated actin in solution. The accuracy and robustness of the estimated rate constants are evaluated for DLS and two other methods, namely quasi-Newton (QN) and simulated annealing (SA). The comparison of these methods revealed that SA provides the best estimates of the model parameters because of its global optimization scheme. However it converges slowly and does quantify the uniqueness of the estimated parameters. On the other hand the QN method converges rapidly but only if the initial guess of the parameters is close to the optimum values, otherwise it diverges. Overall, the DLS method proves to be the most convenient method. It converges fast and was able to provide excellent estimates of kinetic parameters. Furthermore, DLS provides the model resolution matrix, which quantifies the interdependence of model parameters thereby evaluating the uniqueness of their estimated values. This property is essential for estimating of the dependence of the model parameters on experimental conditions (e.g. Ca²⁺ concentration) when it is assessed from noisy experimental data such as pyrene fluorescence from stopped-flow transients. The advantages of the DLS method observed in this study should be further examined in other physicochemical systems to firmly establish the observed effectiveness of DSL vs. the other parameter estimation methods.     

Linear interval inequalities

We prove that a system of linear inequalities with interval-valued data is weakly solvable (each system obtained by fixing coefficeints in the intervals prescribed has a solution) if and only if it is strongly solvable (all such systems have a solution in common) and desribe an algorithm for checking strong solvability.     

Monotonicity properties of operations on generalized topologies

Summary In the paper [5], several operations on generalized topologies are considered. They are not monotone in general, but an old result on monotonicity may be sharpened.     

Experimental characterisation, optimisation and design of erbium-doped silica fibre lasers

A new characterisation method is described using the new theoretical model for erbium-doped silica fibre lasers (EDSFLs) based on the energy conservation principle. Using this method, we obtained absorption and emission coefficients for the lasing wavelength at lasing operating conditions. After that, an experimental procedure to deduce the spectral profiles of the absorption and emission coefficients is also presented. This procedure allows us to obtain the values of these parameters for the whole fluorescence spectrum through measurements of gain profiles under the lasing operation. Once the absorption and emission coefficients are known, the new model can be applied and a comparison with experimental results for two different laser configurations is shown. The theoretical model is proved to be accurate and in addition some equations are developed to allow the design and optimisation of EDSFLs. This revised version was published online in March 2005. In the previous version, the published online date was missing