Abnormal broadening in triplet-to-triplet absorption spectra caused by aromatic solvents

The triplet-triplet absorption spectra of a number of aromatic molecules were shown to be broadened in low temperature matrices formed by aromatic solvents (toluene, 4-isopropylbiphenyl) as compared with those in aliphatic solvents (ethanol, methylcyclohexane, triethylamine). The effect is exponentially dependent on the energy of the upper triplet state of the solute molecule. The phenomenon is discussed in terms of a strong exchange-resonance interaction between the triplet states of solute and solvent.     

Oxidation of bridging groups by carboxylate coordinated ligands in palladium clusters

Thermolysis of tetranuclear palladium clusters Pd₄(-Q)₄ Pd₄(-Q)₄(-O₂CR)₄ (Q=CPh₂ or CO;R=Me, CMe₃, Ph, CH₂Cl or CF₃) has been found to involve innersphere oxidation of carbene or carbonyl ligands during which an oxygen atom transfer occurs from the carboxylate group to the carbene or carbonyl ligand. The thermolysis of the carbonyl clusters gives rise to the products of CO₂ insertion into the C–H bond of benzene or toluene used as solvents forming benzoic acid from benzene and a mixture of phenylacetic and toluic acids from toluene. The reaction of [Pd(OAc)₂(PPh₃)]₂ with HCO₂H includes the transfer of an O atom from formate ligand to the P atom and cleavage of the P-Ph bond accompanied by transfer of the Ph group from PPh₃ ligand to the palladium atom. The structure of the complex formed, [Pd(-O₂PPh₂)(C₆H₅)(PPh₃)]₂, has been resolved by X-ray analysis.     

Intramolecular Catalysis in Reactions of Hydroxamic Acids

Among hydroxamate ions (typical nucleophiles), anomalously high nucleophilicity relative to 4-nitrophenyl diethyl phosphonate is seen in anions which have general basic catalytic sites that provide anchimeric assistance for proton transfer in the transition state.     

Muon transfer from mesic hydrogen to lithium and the atomic intershell correlations

The rates of the molecular muon transfer from mesic hydrogen to lithium are calculated. The obtained rates are of the order of magnitude 10⁶ s^?1. It is shown, that taking into account the intershell correlations results in a considerable change in the reaction rates for some isotope mixtures. The experimental study of the muon transfer can yield an information about the contribution of the intershell correlations to the rate of the process.     

Structural, textural, and electronic properties of a nanosized mesoporous ZnxTi1-xO2-) solid solution prepared by a supercritical drying route

Mesoporous nanosized TiO2 and Zn(x)Ti(1-x)O(2-x) solid solution having a Zn content below 10 mol % with a particles size between 13 and 17 nm are prepared by a template-free sol-gel method followed by high-temperature supercritical drying in 2-propanol. The structural, textural, and electronic properties of the obtained nanomaterials are methodically investigated by using XRD, SEM, TEM, ED, HREM, EDX, ICP-OES, N(2) adsorption-desorption, Raman spectroscopy, and diffuse reflectance UV-vis spectroscopy. It is shown that the proposed synthesis technique leads to the formation of a Zn(x)Ti(1-x)O(2-x) solid solution based on the anatase crystal structure rather than a two-phase sample. High-resolution electron microscopy and electron diffraction indicate that the distribution of zinc atoms over the anatase structure does not lead to a considerable deformation of the crystal structure.     

Molecular diversity management strategies for building and enhancement of diverse and focused lead discovery compound screening collections

This publication describes processes for the selection of chemical compounds for the building of a high-throughput screening (HTS) collection for drug discovery, using the currently implemented process in the Discovery Technologies Unit of the Novartis Institute for Biomedical Research, Basel Switzerland as reference. More generally, the currently existing compound acquisition models and practices are discussed. Our informatics, chemistry and biology-driven compound selection consists of two steps: 1) The individual compounds are filtered and grouped into three priority classes on the basis of their individual structural properties. Substructure filters are used to eliminate or penalize compounds based on unwanted structural properties. The similarity of the structures to reference ligands of the main proven druggable target families is computed, and drug-similar compounds are prioritized for the following diversity analysis. 2) The compounds are compared to the archive compounds and a diversity analysis is performed. This is done separately for the prioritized, regular and penalized compounds with increasingly stringent dissimilarity criterion. The process includes collecting vendor catalogues and monitoring the availability of samples together with the selection and purchase decision points. The development of a corporate vendor catalogue database is described. In addition to the selection methods on a per single molecule basis, selection criteria for scaffold and combinatorial chemistry projects in collaboration with compound vendors are discussed.     

Detection of explosives on solid surfaces by thermal desorption and ambient ion/molecule reactions

A simple, fast and direct method is presented for detecting traces of solid explosives on cotton swabs or in particulate samples: ions are transferred into a mass spectrometer after thermal desorption and corona discharge chemical ionization in ambient air; specificity is enhanced using ambient ion/molecule reactions or by conventional tandem mass spectrometry.