Neighborhood unions and extremal spanning trees

We generalize a known sufficient condition for the traceability of a graph to a condition for the existence of a spanning tree with a bounded number of leaves. Both of the conditions involve neighborhood unions. Further, we present two results on spanning spiders (trees with a single branching vertex). We pose a number of open questions concerning extremal spanning trees.     

One-pot synthesis of 1-hydroxymethylene-1,1-bisphosphonate partial esters

A selective one-pot procedure of synthesis of 1-hydroxymethylene-1,1-bisphosphonic partial trimethylesters and P,P-, P,P′-diesters was described.     

Solution,Crystal and in Silico Structures of the Organometallic Vitamin B12-Derivative Acetylcobalamin and of its Novel Rhodium-Analogue Acetylrhodibalamin

The natural vitamin B₁₂-derivatives are intriguing complexes of cobalt that entrap the metal within the strikingly skewed and ring-contracted corrin ligand. Here, we describe the synthesis of the Rh(III)-corrin acetylrhodibalamin ( AcRhbl ) from biotechnologically produced metal-free hydrogenobyric acid and analyze the effect of the replacement of the cobalt-center of the organometallic vitamin B₁₂-derivative acetylcobalamin ( AcCbl ) with its group-IX homologue rhodium, to give AcRhbl . The structures of AcCbl and AcRhbl were thoroughly analyzed in aqueous solution, in crystals and by in silico methods, in order to gain detailed insights into the structural adaptations to the two homologous metals. Indeed, the common, nucleotide-appended corrin-ligand in these two metal corrins features extensive structural similarity. Thus, the rhodium-corrin AcRhbl joins the small group of B₁₂-mimics classified as ‘antivitamins B₁₂’, isostructural metal analogues of the natural cobalt-corrins that hold significant potential in biological and biomedical applications as selective inhibitors of key cellular processes.     

Determination of 226Ra in solid samples of few milligrams after mineralisation and measurement by solid scintillation

A protocol is proposed for the measurement of ²²⁶Ra on 150 mg of solid sample without radiochemistry. To evaluate the performance of this method, standard samples were used and the results were in good agreement with reference values. The detection limit obtained is about 130 Bq kg⁻¹ (dry weight) without mineralised solution concentration by evaporation. A concentration of the solution by 4 and/or an increase of sample mass by 4 in the case of microwave digestion system, allows achieving a detection limit of 30 Bq kg⁻¹ (dry weight) and thus measuring ²²⁶Ra in most soils. This method could also be used for NORM sites on soil and sediment samples.

     

Collision of Almost Parallel Vortex Filaments

We investigate the occurrence of collisions in the evolution of vortex filaments through a system introduced by Klein, Majda, and Damodaran and Zakharov . We first establish rigorously the existence of a pair of almost parallel vortex filaments, with opposite circulation, colliding at some point in finite time. The collision mechanism is based on one of the self‐similar solutions of the model, described by the authors in an earlier work. In the second part of this paper we extend this construction to the case of an arbitrary number of filaments, with polygonal symmetry, that are perturbations of a configuration of parallel vortex filaments forming a polygon, with or without its center, rotating with constant angular velocity.© 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Oxygen-induced concurrent ultrasonic degradation of volatile and non-volatile aromatic compounds

Acoustic cavitation, induced by ultrasound, can be used to eliminate organic pollutants from water. This type of ultrasonic treatment of polluted water can be grouped with those generally referred to as advanced oxidative processes since it involves hydroxyl radicals. In this case these highly active species are generated from the dissociation of water and oxygen dissociation caused by cavitation bubble collapse. The cavitation induced degradation rates of organic compounds in water are mainly linked to their vapor pressure and solubility and here we will further explore these links by examining the degradation of a mixture of two materials with different physical properties, chlorobenzene and 4-chlorophenol. The results obtained when a dilute solution of a mixture of these compounds saturated with argon is subjected to sonication at 300 kHz, parallels previous observations achieved in an aerated aqueous medium at 500 kHz. The two compounds exhibit sequential degradation with the more volatile chlorobenzene entering the cavitation bubble and being destroyed first. The 4-chlorophenol degradation occurs subsequently only when the chlorobenzene has been completely destroyed. The two compounds exhibit different behavior when sonicated in water saturated with oxygen. Under these conditions the two compounds are degraded simultaneously, a remarkable result for which two explanations can be proposed, both of which are based on the formation of additional OH radical species: The ability to produce conditions for the simultaneous elimination of two organic compounds by the use of oxygen is of great importance in the developing field of ultrasonic water treatment.     

UV-ABC screens of luteolin derivatives compared to edelweiss extract

Pure luteolin is a remarkably heat (200°C/6 days) and UV stable UV-A screen, however, native luteolin enriched to 37% in an edelweiss extract lost its UV-A screen properties upon UV irradiation (～4MJm(-2)). This contrasting behavior led to the examination of a series of purified luteolin derivatives as UV screen candidates. 3',4',5,7-Tetralipoyloxyflavones were synthesized from luteolin (3',4',5,7-tetrahydroxyflavone) and fatty acid chlorides. These acylated semi-biomolecules show a hypsochromic shift in UV-Vis spectra of about Δλ(A→B)=58nm and absorbed in the centre of the harmful UV-B band (λ(max)=295nm). Luteolin was also hydroxyethylated with Br(CH(2))(2)OH. This substitution has no effect on the λ(max)=330nm absorption of luteolin (UV-A band). Finally the natural 4'-O-β-glucosyl-3',5,7-trihydroxyflavone was extracted from edelweiss and used as a purified natural benchmark. Glycosylated and hydroxyethylated luteolin are both UV stable. Fully acylated luteolin derivatives degrade upon UV exposure to a stable UV-C screen with a hypsochroic shift Δλ(B→C)=35nm. All in all, three molecular structures based on luteolin with sunscreen properties were found, distinguishable in: UV-A, UV-B, and UV-C filters. The natural product based UV-absorbers show promise as alternatives to synthetic molecules and nanoparticles in sunscreen products.     

Synthesis of new 9-hydroxy-α- and 7-hydroxy-β-pyran naphthoquinones and cytotoxicity against cancer cell lines

A synthetic method to obtain α- and β-pyran naphthoquinones 10 and 11 with a hydroxyl substituent on the aromatic ring was developed. Two series of α- and β-pyran naphthoquinones were obtained from the 8-hydroxy-lawsone, and their anticancer properties were evaluated against four tumor cell lines. In general, the new compounds displayed good activity, possibly indicating that these compounds have increased pro-oxidant capacity. The 9-hydroxy-α-lapachone and 7-hydroxy-β-lapachone analogues of the natural products α-lapachone and β-lapachone were successfully produced by this methodology.