Main‐chain viologen polymers with organic counterions exhibiting thermotropic liquid‐crystalline and fluorescent properties*

A series of viologen polymers with bromide, tosylate, and triflimide as counterions were prepared by either the Menshutkin reaction or metathesis reaction in a common organic solvent. Their polyelectrolyte behavior in methanol was determined by solution viscosity measurements, and their chemical structures were determined by Fourier transform infrared and Fourier transform NMR spectroscopy. They were characterized for their thermotropic liquid‐crystalline properties with a number of experimental techniques. Each of the viologen polymers with organic counterions had a low melting transition or fusion temperature above which it formed either a high‐order smectic phase or a low‐order smectic phase. Each of them also exhibited a smectic‐to‐isotropic transition. The ranges of the liquid‐crystalline phase were 80–88 °C for viologen polymers with tosylate as a counterion and 120–146 °C for viologen polymers with triflimide as a counterion. They had excellent thermal stability. The ranges of thermal stability were 288–329 °C for viologen polymers with tosylate as a counterion and 343–350 °C for viologen polymers with triflimide as a counterion. The fluorescence property for all of the viologen polymers in either aqueous or methanol solution was also included in this study. For example, the viologen polymer containing the 4,4′‐bipyridinium and p‐xylyl units along the backbone of the polymer chain with triflimide as a counterion had an absorption spectrum (λ_max = 265 nm), an excitation spectrum (λ_ex values = 357, 443, and 454 with monitoring at 533 nm), and an emission spectrum (λ_em = 536 nm with excitation at 430 and 450 nm) in methanol. © 2002 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Polym Sci Part A: Polym Chem 40: 659–674, 2002; DOI 10.1002/pola.10134     

Synthesis and photochromic properties of molecules containing [e]-annelated dihydropyrenes. Two and three way pi-switches based on the dimethyldihydropyrene-metacyclophanediene valence isomerization

The syntheses of several new simple negative, a simple positive, and multiple negative photochromes containing the dihydropyrene-cyclophanediene photochromic system are described. The photo-openings of the negative photochromes, the [e]-annelated benzo (7), naphtho (9), anthro (11), furano (19), and triphenyleno (15) derivatives of the parent 2,7-di-tert-butyl-trans-10b,10c-dimethyl-dihydropyrene (5), as well as its 4,5-dibromo derivative (13), are described to give the corresponding cyclophanedienes, as well as their photoclosures and thermal closures back to the dihydropyrenes. These are compared to the results obtained for the positive photochrome dibenzo[e,l]dihydropyrene (21) and to the bis(dihydropyreno)chrysene (44) and the (dihydropyrenobenzo)(benzo)metacyclophanediene (47) photochromes, which have more than one photochromic switch present and thus have more than a simple "on-off" state. Thermodynamic data are obtained for the thermal closing reactions. The anthrodihydropyrene (12) has the fastest thermal closing (tau(1/2) = 20 min), while the furanodihydropyrene (19') has the slowest (tau(1/2) = 63 h) at 46 degrees C. An electrochemical readout of the state of the switch is demonstrated for the benzodihydropyrene (7).     

Nitrosation of β′-hydroxylamino-α,β-unsaturated oximes: synthesis of 1,7-dioxa-2,6-diaza-spiro[4,4]nona-2,8-diene ring system

Nitrosation of bis arylidene acetone oximes with nitrous acid in glacial acetic acid gives 3-vinyl pyrazolone-N,N′-dioxides in 32-37% yield. Similar reactions of 2-arylidene-6-(hydroxylamino-aryl-methyl)-cyclohexanone oximes give tricyclic compounds with dioxa-2,6-diaza-spiro[4,4]nona-2,8-diene ring systems in 77-84% yield.     

Bis-amino methylation for the synthesis of spiro-fused piperidines using iron(III) trifluroacetate in aqueous micellar medium

An environmentally benign, multicomponent integrated chemical process has been developed for the synthesis of 3,5-dispirosubstituted piperidines by cyclo-condensation reaction of amines, formaldehyde, and dimedone using iron(III) trifluroacetate [Fe(F₃CCO₂)₃] Lewis acid in aqueous micellar medium at ambient temperature (25–30 °C). The heterogeneous solid acid catalyst conveniently promotes this double amino methylation reaction in which six molecules condense in one pot to form six new covalent bonds. The synthesized 3,5-dispirosubstituted piperidines have been screened for their in vitro antibacterial activity using agar well method. Many of these compounds showed satisfactory antibacterial activity as compared to standard drugs against all the bacteria tested.     

Trifluoroethanol and liquid-assisted grinding method: a green catalytic access for multicomponent synthesis

Research on Chemical Intermediates - An efficient and versatile mechanochemical route for the synthesis of chromene and isoindolo[2,1-a]quinazoline scaffolds has been developed via a simple mortar...     

An algorithm for overlapped chromatogram separation

Non-negative matrix factorization (NMF) is a recently developed method for real time data analysis. In the past it has been used for facial recognition and spectral data analysis. Most of the NMF algorithms do not converge to a stable limit point and uniqueness in results is also a problem in NMF. To improve the convergence, a new NMF algorithm with modified multiplicative update (ML-NMFmse) has been proposed in this work for strongly overlapped and embedded chromatograms separation. To get same results for all the runs, instead of random initialization, three different initialization methods have been used namely, ALS–NMF (robust initialization), NNDSVD based initialization and EFA based initializations. The proposed ML-NMFmse algorithm is applied on the simulated and experimental overlapped chromatograms obtained for acetone and acrolein mixture, using Gas Chromatography–Flame Ionization Detector. Before applying NMF, Principal Component Analysis (PCA) was applied to determine number of components in the mixture taken. The result of proposed ML-NMFmse is compared with that of existing Multivariate Curve Resolution-Alternating Least Squares method in optimal conditions for both the algorithms. In the case of embedded chromatogram, the proposed ML-NMFmse with Robust method (ALS-NMF) of initialization performs better than all other methods. For a resolution of severely overlapped chromatograms, the proposed ML-NMFmse with NNDSVD method of initialization outperforms all other methods.     

Parametric inference for multiple repairable systems under dependent competing risks

The focus of this article is on the analysis of repairable systems that are subject to multiple sources of recurrence. The event of interest at the system level is assumed to be caused by the earliest occurrence of a source, thereby conforming to a series system competing risks framework. Parametric inference is carried out under the power law process model that has found significant attention in industrial applications. Dependence among the cause‐specific recurrent processes is induced via a shared frailty structure. The theoretical inference results are implemented to a warranty database for a fleet of automobiles, for which the warranty repair is triggered by the failure of one of many components. Extensive finite‐sample simulation is carried out to supplement the asymptotic findings. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Synthesis and solid-state structures of dimethyl 2,2'-bithiophenedicarboxylates

The syntheses of dimethyl 2,2'-bithiophene-4,4'-dicarboxylate (3), dimethyl 2,2'-bithiophene-3,4'-dicarboxylate (4), and dimethyl 2,2'-bithiophene-3,3'-dicarboxylate (5) are described. Single-crystal X-ray structural analysis of these compounds shows that the thiophene rings in 3 and 4 are nearly coplanar (dihedral angle close to 0 degrees ) and they adopt the anti sulfur conformation in the solid state. Further, the structure of 4 is in agreement with our previous suggestion that there is an electrostatic stabilization of the planar structure due to attraction of the 3-carbonyl oxygen to the sulfur of the distal ring. In 5, however, the thiophene rings are nearly perpendicular (dihedral angle 75 degrees ), indicating considerable steric hindrance between the two large ester groups at the 3- and 3'-positions. Unlike compounds 3 and 4, where the thiophene rings have the sulfur atoms anti, the sulfur atoms in 5 are completely syn. This is the first instance where a bithiophene has been shown to adopt a conformation where the sulfur atoms are completely syn. The solid-state conformations of 3, 4, and 5 are in agreement with ab initio theoretical calculations on these compounds; particularly, the planar conformations of 3 and 4 reflect the previously calculated low rotation barriers of these molecules.     

Simplification of the Clegg-Pitzer-Brimblecombe Mole-Fraction Composition Based Model Equations for Binary Solutions,Conversion of the Margules Expansion Terms into a Virial Form,and Comparison with an Extended Ion-Interaction (Pitzer) Model

Clegg, Pitzer, and Brimblecombe (J. Phys. Chem. 96:9470–9479, 1992) described a thermodynamic model for representing the activities of solutes and a solvent, for a single electrolyte and for mixtures of arbitrary complexity, which is valid to very high concentrations including electrolytes approaching complete mutual solubility. This model contains a Debye-Hückel term along with two ionic-strength-dependent virial terms and a Margules expansion in the mole fractions of the components at the four-suffix level, with ionic strengths expressed on the mole-fraction composition scale. This model is an extension of earlier work by Pitzer and Simonson (J. Phys. Chem. 90:3005–3009, 1986). However, Pitzer’s molality-based ion-interaction model (Activity Coefficients in Electrolyte Solutions, 2nd edn., CRC Press, 1991) is more commonly used for thermodynamic modeling calculations. In this paper we recast the Margules expansion terms of the mole-fraction-based model equations for a single electrolyte in a single solvent into simpler virial expansions in powers of the mole-fraction-based ionic strength. We thereby show that these reformulated equations are functionally analogous to those of Pitzer’s standard ion-interaction model with an additional virial term added that is cubic in the ionic strength. By using a series of algebraic transformations among composition scales, we show that the pairs of terms involving the B_M,X⁽¹⁾B_{\mathrm{M,X}}^{(1)} and the B_M,X⁽²⁾B_{\mathrm{M,X}}^{(2)} parameters in the original mole-fraction-based model expression for the natural logarithm of the mean activity coefficient (and consequently for the excess Gibbs energy) differ from each other only by a simple numerical factor of −2 and, therefore, these four terms can be replaced by two terms yielding simpler expressions. Test calculations are presented for several soluble electrolytes to compare the effectiveness of the reformulated mole-fraction- and molality-based models, at the same virial level in powers of ionic strength, for representing activity data over different ionic strength ranges. The molality-based model gives slightly better fits over the ionic strength range 0 mol⋅kg⁻¹≤I≤6 mol⋅kg⁻¹, whereas the mole-fraction-based model is generally better for more extended ranges.