Fast fission mechanism and duality of the diffusion process

The reaction of ²³⁸U with ¹²C was studied radiochemically with the purpose of elucidating fast fission characteristics. From the difference in the mass distribution below and above the critical energy where fast fission is predicted to set in, fast fission component was extracted in far-asymmetric mass region and interpreted as the mass diffusion following the Fokker-Planck equation. Anomalous charge dispersion widths in the corresponding mass region and a sudden increase of the whole mass distribution width at the critical energy were also observed to support the above result. The reaction time of fast fission deduced from the width and position of the mass distribution was 5×10⁻²¹s as well by taking into account the effect of neutron emission during the diffusion process, which turned out to be more than one order of magnitude longer than the corresponding life time of typical deep inelastic scattering but substantially short compared to ordinary fusion-fission life time. Evaluation of the driving potential for mass drift required dinuclear configuration be of an elongated or deformed form for fast fission in contrast to a more compact form for the deep-inelastic process. Received: 11 November 1997     

Synthesis of perfluorochemicals for use as blood substitutes,part II: electrochemical fluorination of partly fluorinated compounds

Electrochemical fluorination of 2-methoxy-1,1,1-trifluoro-2-(F-methyl) octane gave the corresponding perfluorinated ether in 27% yield, along with cyclic by-products in 9%. A mixture of partly fluorinated tertiary amines, consisting of 1-dipropylamino-F-1-propene and 1-dipropylamino-2-hydryl-F-propane, did not afford a superior yield of tri(F-propyl)amine compared to the unfluorinated tripropylamine. 1-Diethylamino-2-(F-methyl)-F-1-pentene was fluorinated to give the corresponding F-tertiary amine in fairly good yields, together with 1-di(F-ethyl)amino-2-hydryl-2-(F-methyl)-F-pentane and their fragmented products. The study indicates that blocking of the α-carbon atom of an ether with F-methyl groups seems to reduce fragmentation, resulting in good yields of an unrearranged product. However, partial fluorination of a tertiary amine prior to electrochemical fluorination rather allows high yields of undesired by-products, as far as our experiments were concerned.     

The TcO4-binding to human serum albumin --the stoichiometry and characteristics of the binding equilibrium.

The stoichiometry and the characteristics of the TcO4-binding equilibrium to human serum albumin were investigated by the use of 99TcO4-. Based on the Scatchard plots, the number of binding sites and the association constants were obtained at pH 7.38,6.04, 5.10, 4.18, 2.80 and 0.65, respectively. From the parameters at pH 7.38, it was estimated that 64% of TcO4- added was bounded to human serum albumin under physiological condition. Variance in the values at pH 7.38, 6.04 and 5.10 shows that these bindings are stabilized by electrostatic forces. Below pH 4.18, the number of binding sites increased and the association constants constants diminished. These phenomena may be attributed to the conformation change of human serum albumin.     

Direct observation of MoO2 crystal growth from amorphous MoO3 film

The formation process of MoO₂ crystal from amorphous MoO₃ film has been imaged by in situ observation with a transmission electron microscope. Selective growth of flower-shaped MoO₂ crystals by heating above 673 K in vacuum was directly observed. Since the MoO₂ crystal has metallic conductivity of the order of indium oxide film containing tin (ITO film), the thin film growth of the MoO₂ phase has been discussed on the basis of a new substitute for ITO film.     

Post‐Modification of the Ethene Bridge in the Rational Design of Photochromic Diarylethenes

Fine‐tuning of the molecular structure of organic bistable compounds to improve their photochromic performance or to introduce additional functions remains an important issue in the development of photoresponsive materials. Diarylethenes bearing heterocyclic moieties belong to the most intensively studied class of organic photochromes due to their excellent photochemical properties. A huge number of diarylethenes have been synthesized so far. Analysis of the literature data shows that there are very worthy examples of diarylethenes developed by the Irie and Feringa groups, which can be the common starting material for a number of diarylethenes functionalized in hetaryl moieties. We refer to these structures as photochromic diarylethene precursors. These diarylethenes have proved to be very useful in the construction of functional molecules with desired properties. On the other hand, in our groups, we have elaborated on diarylethene precursors with modifiable ethene bridges. In this review, we have collected examples of such structures and their chemical modifications, leading to the improvement or fine‐tuning of photochromic switching.     

Chiral helicenoid diarylethene with large change in specific optical rotation by photochromism

A diarylethene possessing one [4]thiaheterohelicene and one benzothiophene, the latter with a chiral methoxymethoxyethyl group on its C-3 position, was proved to work as a switch of specific optical rotation at a wavelength at which both colored and colorless forms have no absorption in solution. The difference of the specific optical rotation was 1300 degrees between the open form and the photostationary state. The specific optical rotation of one of the isolated optically active major colored forms was -4680 degrees. The conversion to the colored form was 64%, and the diastereomeric excess of photocyclization was 47%.     

Chiral helicenoid diarylethene with highly diastereoselective photocyclization

A novel photochromic helicenoid diarylethene (R)-1-[1-(1-methoxymethoxyethyl)-2-naphtho[2,1-b]thienyl]-2-(2,4,5-trimethyl-3-thienyl)hexafluorocyclopentene was synthesized enantioselectively. It showed highly diastereoselective photocyclization (90% de) and a large change (950 degrees) in the specific optical rotation value at 633 nm upon UV light irradiation in ethyl acetate.     

Primordial non-Gaussianities of gravitational waves in the most general single-field inflation model with second-order field equations

We completely clarify the feature of primordial non-Gaussianities of tensor perturbations in the most general single-field inflation model with second-order field equations. It is shown that the most general cubic action for the tensor perturbation h(ij) is composed only of two contributions, one with two spacial derivatives and the other with one time derivative on each h(ij). The former is essentially identical to the cubic term that appears in Einstein gravity and predicts a squeezed shape, while the latter newly appears in the presence of the kinetic coupling to the Einstein tensor and predicts an equilateral shape. Thus, only two shapes appear in the graviton bispectrum of the most general single-field inflation model, which could open a new clue to the identification of inflationary gravitational waves in observations of cosmic microwave background anisotropies as well as direct detection experiments.