Structural verification of a tetrahydrotetrazole compound

Tetrahydrotetrazoles are five‐membered‐ring heterocycles containing four contiguous saturated nitrogen atoms. Very few examples of such compounds have been reported in the literature. Our previous attempt at the synthesis of a member of this class of compound suggested that the N—N bonds may be more labile than expected. This finding raised the question as to whether the structures of any of the previously reported tetrahydrotetrazoles had been properly assigned. We have reproduced the synthesis of a reported tetrahydrotetrazole, namely 1,2‐di‐tert‐butyl 3‐phenyl‐1H,2H,3H,10bH‐[1,2,3,4]tetrazolo[5,1‐a]isoquinoline‐1,2‐dicarboxylate, C₂₅H₃₀N₄O₄, and have now confidently confirmed its structure via X‐ray crystallography. However, while sufficiently stable in the crystal phase, we discovered that it remains very labile in solution (having a half‐life of only 15 min at 20 °C in CDCl₃). A tentative reaction pathway for its dissociation based on ¹H NMR spectral evidence is provided.     

Metamorphic InAs(Sb)/InGaAs/InAlAs nanoheterostructures grown on GaAs for efficient mid-IR emitters

High-efficiency semiconductor lasers and light-emitting diodes operating in the 3–5?μm mid-infrared (mid-IR) spectral range are currently of great demand for a wide variety of applications, in particular, gas sensing, noninvasive medical tests, IR spectroscopy etc. III-V compounds with a lattice constant of about 6.1?Å are traditionally used for this spectral range. The attractive idea to fabricate such emitters on GaAs substrates by using In(Ga,Al)As compounds is restricted by either the minimum operating wavelength of ～8?μm in case of pseudomorphic AlGaAs-based quantum cascade lasers or requires utilization of thick metamorphic In_xAl_1-xAs buffer layers (MBLs) playing a key role in reducing the density of threading dislocations (TDs) in an active region, which otherwise result in a strong decay of the quantum efficiency of such mid-IR emitters. In this review we present the results of careful investigations of employing the convex-graded In_xAl_1-xAs MBLs for fabrication by molecular beam epitaxy on GaAs (001) substrates of In(Ga,Al)As heterostructures with a combined type-II/type-I InSb/InAs/InGaAs quantum well (QW) for efficient mid-IR emitters (3–3.6?μm). The issues of strain relaxation, elastic stress balance, efficiency of radiative and non-radiative recombination at T?=?10–300?K are discussed in relation to molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) growth conditions and designs of the structures. A wide complex of techniques including in-situ reflection high-energy electron diffraction, atomic force microscopy (AFM), scanning and transmission electron microscopies, X-ray diffractometry, reciprocal space mapping, selective area electron diffraction, as well as photoluminescence (PL) and Fourier-transformed infrared spectroscopy was used to study in detail structural and optical properties of the metamorphic QW structures. Optimization of the growth conditions (the substrate temperature, the As₄/III ratio) and elastic strain profiles governed by variation of an inverse step in the In content profile between the MBL and the InAlAs virtual substrate results in decrease in the TD density (down to 3?×?10⁷ cm^?2), increase of the thickness of the low-TD-density near-surface MBL region to 250–300?nm, the extremely low surface roughness with the RMS value of 1.6–2.4?nm, measured by AFM, as well as rather high 3.5?μm-PL intensity at temperatures up to 300?K in such structures. The obtained results indicate that the metamorphic InSb/In(Ga,Al)As QW heterostructures of proper design, grown under the optimum MBE conditions, are very promising for fabricating the efficient mid-IR emitters on a GaAs platform.     

Syntheses,crystal structures and properties of Cd(II) and Ag(I) complexes based on 2-p-methylphenyl-5-(2-pyridyl)-1,3,4-thiadiazole

Abstract

Complexes of [CdL₂(NO₃)₂]·1.5H₂O and [Ag₂(μ-L)₂(NO₃)₂] were synthesized by the reactions of 2-p-methylphenyl-5-(2-pyridyl)-1,3,4-thiadiazole (L) with Cd(NO₃)₂·4H₂O and AgNO₃, respectively. Their structures were determined by single crystal X-ray diffraction. The photophysical property and thermal stability were characterized by FT???IR, UV???Vis absorption, fluorescence, and thermogravimetric analysis (TGA). Both complexes belong to the triclinic system with space group p???1. The central metal of [CdL₂(NO₃)₂]·1.5H₂O has a distorted octahedral geometry [CdN₄O₂], while two central Ag(I) atoms of [Ag₂(μ-L)₂(NO₃)₂] exhibit distorted tetrahedral geometries [AgN₃O].     

Pyridine solvated dioxouranium complex with salen ligand: Synthesis,characterization and luminescence properties

A new derivative of dioxouranium(VI) salen complex, [UO2(L)(pyridine)], where [L = N,N′-Bis(2-hydroxybenzylidene)-2,2-dimethyl-1,3-propanediamine] is synthesized and characterized by elemental analysis (C, H, N), FT-IR, ESI-MS spectrometry, UV/Vis, fluorescence, ¹H and ¹³C NMR spectroscopy and thermal gravimetric (TG) study. Furthermore, the single crystal X-ray diffraction measurements of the complex were carried out at 100 and 273 K. The crystal structure measurements revealed that the complex has distorted pentagonal bipyramidal geometry with uranium atom located at the centre and bonded to two phenoxy oxygen and two azomethine nitrogen in tetradenate fashion and one nitrogen from pyridine making it seven coordinated. In addition, the photoluminescence property of the complex was also recorded.     

A Biosilification Fusion Protein for a ‘Self‐immobilising’ Sarcosine Oxidase Amperometric Enzyme Biosensor

Monomeric sarcosine oxidase (mSOx) fusion with the silaffin peptide, R5, designed previously for easy protein production in low resource areas, was used in a biosilification process to form an enzyme layer electrode biosensor. mSOx is a low activity enzyme (10–20 U/mg) requiring high amounts of enzyme to obtain an amperometric biosensor signal, in the clinically useful range <1 mM sarcosine, especially since the K_m is >10 mM. An amperometric biosensor model was fitted to experimental data to investigate dynamic range. mSOx constructs were designed with 6H (6×histidine) and R5 (silaffin) peptide tags and compared with native mSOx. Glutaraldehyde (GA) cross‐linked proteins retained ～5 % activity for mSOx and mSOx‐6H and only 0.5 % for mSOx‐R5. In contrast R5 catalysed biosilification on (3‐mercaptopropyl) trimethoxysilane (MPTMS) and tetramethyl orthosilicate (TMOS) particles created a ‘self‐immobilisation’ matrix retaining 40 % and 76 % activity respectively. The TMOS matrix produced a thick layer (>500 μm) on a glassy carbon electrode with a mediated current due to sarcosine in the clinical range for sarcosinemia (0–1 mM). The mSOx‐R5 fusion protein was also used to catalyse biosilification in the presence of creatinase and creatininase, entrapping all three enzymes. A mediated GC enzyme linked current was obtained with dynamic range available for creatinine determination of 0.1–2 mM for an enzyme layer ～800 nm.     

The Szegö kernel on a class of non-compact CR manifolds of high codimension

We generalize Nagel’s formula for the Szegö kernel and use it to compute the Szegö kernel on a class of non-compact CR manifolds whose tangent space decomposes into one complex direction and several totally real directions. We also discuss the control metric on these manifolds and relate it to the size of the Szegö kernel.     

Near-Ultraviolet Circular Dichroism and Two-Dimensional Spectroscopy of Polypeptides

A fully quantitative theory of the relationship between protein conformation and optical spectroscopy would facilitate deeper insights into biophysical and simulation studies of protein dynamics and folding. In contrast to intense bands in the far-ultraviolet, near-UV bands are much weaker and have been challenging to compute theoretically. We report some advances in the accuracy of calculations in the near-UV, which were realised through the consideration of the vibrational structure of the electronic transitions of aromatic side chains.     

Identifying aspirin polymorphs from combined DFT-based crystal structure prediction and solid-state NMR

A combined experimental and computational approach was used to distinguish between different polymorphs of the pharmaceutical drug aspirin. This method involves the use of ab initio random structure searching (AIRSS), a density functional theory (DFT)-based crystal structure prediction method for the high-accuracy prediction of polymorphic structures, with DFT calculations of nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) parameters and solid-state NMR experiments at natural abundance. AIRSS was used to predict the crystal structures of form-I and form-II of aspirin. The root-mean-square deviation between experimental and calculated ¹H chemical shifts was used to identify form-I as the polymorph present in the experimental sample, the selection being successful despite the large similarities between the molecular environments in the crystals of the two polymorphs.     

Meshless acoustic analysis using a weakly singular Burton-Miller boundary integral formulation

The Burton-Miller boundary integral formulation is solved by a complex variable boundary element-free method (CVBEFM) for the boundary-only meshless analysis of acoustic problems with arbitrary wavenumbers. To regularize both strongly singular and hypersingular integrals and to avoid the computation of the solid angle and its normal derivative, a weakly singular Burton-Miller formulation is derived by considering the normal derivative of the solid angle and adopting the singularity subtraction procedures. To facilitate the implementation of the CVBEFM and the approximation of gradients of the boundary variables, a stabilized complex variable moving least-square approximation is selected in the meshless discretization procedure. The results show the accuracy and efficiency of the present CVBEFM and reveal that the method can produce satisfactory results for all wavenumbers, even for extremely large wavenumbers such as k = 10 000.     

Functionalized Silver-Ion-Mediated α-dC/β-dC Hybrid Base Pairs with Exceptional Stability: α-d-5-Iodo-2′-Deoxycytidine and Its Octadiynyl Derivative in Metal DNA

Silver-mediated α-dC–Ag⁺–β-dC hybrid base pairs decorated with 5-iodo- or 5-octadiynyl residues are well accommodated in duplex DNA. A strong T_m increase and favorable thermodynamic data for duplex DNA were observed after addition of silver ions. The phenomenon is particularly obvious when both nucleobases of the base pairs are functionalized. Neither the position of the base pair, nor the type of 5-substituent had a negative influence. On the contrary, functionalization of conventional silver-mediated β-dC–Ag⁺–β-dC homo base pairs showed a negative impact induced by the bulky substituents. To this end, cytosine modified 12-mer oligodeoxynucleotides were prepared by solid-phase synthesis employing new α-anomeric 2′-deoxycytidine phosphoramidites. A multigram scale synthesis was developed for 5-iodo-α-d -2′-deoxycytidine ( 1 ) employing the direct glycosylation of cytosine with Hoffer's α-d -halogenose followed by separation of anomeric DMT nucleosides. Regarding base-pair stability and functionalization silver-mediated α/β-dC hybrid base pairs were found to be superior to β/β-dC homo pairs. According to their extraordinary properties, they might find applications in DNA diagnostics, material science, or nanotechnology.