High‐Performance,Stretchable, Wire‐Shaped Supercapacitors

A general approach toward extremely stretchable and highly conductive electrodes was developed. The method involves wrapping a continuous carbon nanotube (CNT) thin film around pre‐stretched elastic wires, from which high‐performance, stretchable wire‐shaped supercapacitors were fabricated. The supercapacitors were made by twisting two such CNT‐wrapped elastic wires, pre‐coated with poly(vinyl alcohol)/H₃PO₄ hydrogel, as the electrolyte and separator. The resultant wire‐shaped supercapacitors exhibited an extremely high elasticity of up to 350 % strain with a high device capacitance up to 30.7 F g⁻¹, which is two times that of the state‐of‐the‐art stretchable supercapacitor under only 100 % strain. The wire‐shaped structure facilitated the integration of multiple supercapacitors into a single wire device to meet specific energy and power needs for various potential applications. These supercapacitors can be repeatedly stretched from 0 to 200 % strain for hundreds of cycles with no change in performance, thus outperforming all the reported state‐of‐the‐art stretchable electronics.     

Development and application of an analytical method for curdione quantification in pregnant sprague–dawley rats by LC‐MS/MS

The vaginal administration route suffers from relatively low absorption efficiency, which may hinder the identification of the toxicokinetics of curdione in pregnant women. A sensitive analytical method for determining the plasma concentration of curdione was developed and applied in the determination of curdione in pregnant Sprague–Dawley rats as a simulated model. Glimepiride was used as an internal standard and chromatographic separation was achieved on a Capcell Pak C₁₈ MGIII column. A gradient elution profile with 0.5% formic acid (A)–0.5% formic acid–acetonitrile (B) was selected as mobile phase. The selected reaction monitoring mode was used for quantification based on the target fragment ions m/z 237.2 to m/z 135.1 for curdione and m/z 491.3 to m/z 352.1 for the glimepiride. The standard curve was linear over the range of 0.5–500 ng/mL for curdione in rat plasma and yielded a consistent peak pattern, even at the lower limit of quantitation of 0.5 ng/mL. The retention times of curdione and IS were 6.55 and 6.59 min, respectively. The mean recovery of curdione in rat plasma was 95.5–101.1%. The intra‐day and inter‐day precisions were between 2.35 and 9.08%. This LC‐MS/MS method provides a simple and sensitive means for determining the plasma concentration. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A two-strain epidemic model with mutant strain and vaccination

In this paper, it is assumed that the spread of a pathogen can mutate in the host to create a second, cocirculating, mutant strain. Vaccinated individuals perhaps becomes infected after being in contact with individuals infected with mutant strain. A?two-strain epidemic model with vaccination is firstly investigated. The existence and stability properties of equilibria in this model are examined. By analyzing the characteristic equation and constructing Lyapunov functions, the conditions for local and global stability of the infection-free, boundary and endemic equilibria are established. The existence of Hopf bifurcation from the endemic equilibrium is also examined as this equilibrium loses its stability. Our theoretical results are confirmed by numerical simulations.     

Novel Surfactant-like Hypocrellin Derivatives to Achieve Simultaneous Drug Delivery in Blood Plasma and Cell Uptake

Water-soluble derivatives of hypocrellins can be safely delivered in blood plasma but lose their photodynamic activity in vivo due to poor cell uptake, while hydrophobic derivatives retaining their activity may aggregate in the blood plasma and block vascular networks. Considering both drug delivery and biological activity, surfactant-like hypocrellin B (HB) derivatives, sodium 12-2-HB-aminododecanoate (SAHB) and sodium 11,11′-5,8-HB-dimercaptoundecanoate (DMHB), were first designed and then synthesized in the current work. Both SAHB and DMHB were photoactive, generating free radicals and reactive oxygen species, as confirmed by EPR and chemical measurements. Most importantly, DMHB was not only readily soluble, allowing preparation of an intravenous injection solution at a clinically acceptable concentration, but it was also more photodynamic therapy (PDT) active to human breast carcinoma MCF-7 cells than its parent HB under irradiation. The photodynamic activity was exactly identical to the ¹O₂ quantum yield and was not reduced by the improved water solubility, suggesting an independent hydrophilicity or lipophilicity. To our knowledge, this is a new strategy that possesses general significance for converting hydrophobic photosensitizers into clinically usable PDT drugs.     

SYNTHESIS OF O,O-DIPHENYL [SUBSTITUTED (2-SELENOMORPHOLIN-4-YL-ACETYL AMINO)] ALKYL PHOSPHONATES

A series of O,O-diphenyl [substituted (2-selenomorpholin-4-yl-acetyl amino)] alkyl phosphonates were synthesized by the reactions of selenomorpholine with O,O-diphenyl 2-chloro- acetylamino alkyl phosphonates. The structures of all new compounds have been confirmed by ¹ H NMR, ³¹ P NMR, IR spectroscopy, Mass spectroscopy and elemental analyses.     

Synthesis and Characterization of Fluorinated Bisphenols and Tetraphenols via a Simple One-Pot Reaction

Fluorinated bisphenols and tetraphenols have been prepared by the condensation reaction of trifluoromethyl activated ketones with simple bisphenols (including catechol, resorcinol, and hydroquinone) catalyzed by trifluoromethanesulfonic acid, in good yields.

Supplemental materials are available for this article. Go to the publisher's online edition of Synthetic Communications® to view the free supplemental file.     

A novel optically active diblock copolymer composed of poly(ethylene glycol) and poly[N‐{o‐(4‐phenyl‐4,5‐dihydro‐1,3‐oxazol‐2‐yl)phenyl}maleimide]: Synthesis,micellization behavior,and chiroptical property

A series of optically active amphiphilic block copolymers were synthesizedby using potassium alkoxide of poly(ethylene glycol) monomethyl ether (MeOPEGO^?K⁺) to initiate the anionic polymerization of N‐{o‐(4‐phenyl‐4,5‐dihydro‐1,3‐oxazol‐2‐yl)phenyl}maleimide [(R)‐PhOPMI]. The PEG‐macroinitiators generated in situ in the reaction between MeOPEGOH and potassium naphthylide in tetrahydrofuran. The synthetic procedure may provide the PEG‐b‐PPhOPMI copolymers with well‐defined structure, as evidenced by gel permeation chromatography, ¹H NMR, FTIR, and elemental analysis. In particular, the preparation of block copolymers having a laevorotation or dextrorotation activity was accomplished by changing the feed composition. The micellization was examined for the amphiphilic block copolymers in aqueous milieu by fluorescence spectroscopy, dynamic light scattering, and circular dichroism. The results indicate that the copolymers could form regular spherical micelles with core‐shell structure when the hydrophilic component was long enough; in contrast, the copolymers containing shorter PEG segments formed aggregates in large dimension due to the considerable interaction between hydrophobic PPhOPMI components. Also, it was found that the aggregated structure of the polymeric micelles is strongly dependent on the medium nature and the polymer concentration. © 2007 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Polym Sci Part A: Polym Chem 46: 1025–1033, 2008     

An efficient synthesis of sulfamides

Here we report an efficient synthesis of sulfamides. 3,5-Lutidine was found to be an optimal solvent and catalyst for the reaction. The method was developed during our efforts to synthesize a series of novel FKBP-12 inhibitors in which the known ketoamide linker was replaced with sulfamide.