Core-shell type polymer microspheres prepared by domain fixing of block copolymer films

Well-defined poly[styrene(S)-b-isoprene(I)] diblock copolymers were prepared by sequential anionic addition. The crosslinking reactions of polyisoprene (PI) spherical domains of these block copolymers were carried out in a n-hexane solution of sulfur monochloride (S₂Cl₂). Electron micrograph of crosslinked products indicates the structure of core-shell type polymer microspheres. It is found from NMR and turbi+imetric measurements that the solubility of core-shell type polymer microspheres depends strongly on that of block chains comprising the shell portion. The particle size of these microspheres shows a narrow distribution.     

Characterization of humic substances: Implications for trihalomethane formation

Humic substances are precursors of carcinogenic trihalomethanes (THMs) formed during disinfection by chlorination in water treatment processes. In an effort to understand the relationship between trihalomethane formation potential (THMFP) and physicochemical properties of humic substances, UV-visible absorbance, fluorescence in emission and synchronous scan modes, and NMR spectra were measured for several aquatic fulvic and humic acids. For comparison, a soil fulvic acid was also examined using these methods. The feasibility of the gradient modified spin-echo (GOSE) NMR experiment to selectively measure singlet resonances arising from isolated protons was examined. In addition, diffusion coefficients were measured for DMSO solutions of the fulvic acids using BPPLED and GOSE-edited pulse sequences. Although none of the methods tested produced results that correlated with THMFP, the GOSE intensities determined for different regions of the NMR spectra did reflect the relative abundance of different types of functional groups produced by lignin oxidation. In addition, the GOSE-edited diffusion results suggest that the isolated protons, those most reactive to chlorination, are more likely contained in the larger molecular weight fractions of fulvic acids.     

Five new nortropane alkaloids and six new amino acids from the fruit of Morus alba LINNE growing in Turkey

Investigation of the constituents of the fruits of Morus alba LINNE (Moraceae) afforded five new nortropane alkaloids (1-5) along with nor-psi-tropine (6) and six new amino acids, morusimic acids A-F (7-12). The structures of the new compounds were determined to be 2alpha,3beta-dihydroxynortropane (1), 2beta,3beta-dihydroxynortropane (2), 2alpha,3beta,6exo-trihydroxynortropane (3), 2alpha,3beta,4alpha-rihydroxynortropane (4), 3beta,6exo-dihydroxynortropane (5), (3R)-3-hydroxy-12-[(1S,4S)-4-[(1S)-1-hydroxyethyl]-pyrrolidin-1-yll-dodecanoic acid-3-O-beta-D-glucopyranoside (7), (3R)-3-hydroxy-12-[(1S,4S)-4-[(1S)-1-hydroxyethyl]-pyrrolidin-1-yll-dodecanoic acid (8), (3R)-3-hydroxy-12-1(1R,4R,5S)-4-hydroxy-5-methyl-piperidin-1-yll-dodecanoic acid-3-O-beta-D-glucopyranoside (9), (3R)-3-hydroxy-12-[(1R,4R,5S)-4-hydroxy-5-methyl-piperidin-1-yll-dodecanoic acid (10), (3R)-3-hydroxy-12-[(1R,4R,5S)-4-hydroxy-5-hydroxymethyl-piperidin-1-yl]-dodecanoic acid-3-O-beta-D-glucopyranoside (11), and (3R)-3-hydroxy-12-[(1R,4S,5S)-4-hydroxy-5-methyl-piperidin-1-yl]-dodecanoic acid (12) on the basis of spectral and chemical data.     

Variable neighborhood search for minimum cost berth allocation

The berth allocation problem is to allocate space along the quayside to incoming ships at a container terminal in order to minimize some objective function. We consider minimization of total costs for waiting and handling as well as earliness or tardiness of completion, for all ships. We assume ships can arrive at any given time, i.e., before or after the berths become available. The resulting problem, which subsumes several previous ones, is expressed as a linear mixed 0–1 program. As it turns out to be too time-consuming for exact solution of instances of realistic size, a Variable Neighborhood Search (VNS) heuristic is proposed, and compared with Multi-Start (MS), a Genetic Search algorithm (GA) and a Memetic Search algorithm (MA). VNS provides optimal solutions for all instances solved to optimality in a previous paper of the first two authors and outperforms MS, MA and GA on large instances.     

Synthesis of pyrazoles via electrophilic cyclization

Electrophilic cyclizations of α,β-alkynic hydrazones by molecular iodine were investigated for the synthesis of 4-iodopyrazoles. α,β-Alkynic hydrazones were readily prepared by the reactions of hydrazines with propargyl aldehydes and ketones. When treated with molecular iodine in the presence of sodium bicarbonate, α,β-alkynic hydrazones underwent electrophilic cyclization to afford 4-iodopyrazoles in good to high yields. Iodocyclization was general for a wide range of α,β-alkynic hydrazones and tolerated the presence of aliphatic, aromatic, heteroaromatic, and ferrocenyl moieties with electron-withdrawing and electron-donating substituents.     

Dealing with repetitions in sequencing by hybridization

DNA sequencing by hybridization (SBH) induces errors in the biochemical experiment. Some of them are random and disappear when the experiment is repeated. Others are systematic, involving repetitions in the probes of the target sequence. A good method for solving SBH problems must deal with both types of errors. In this work we propose a new hybrid genetic algorithm for isothermic and standard sequencing that incorporates the concept of structured combinations. The algorithm is then compared with other methods designed for handling errors that arise in standard and isothermic SBH approaches. DNA sequences used for testing are taken from GenBank. The set of instances for testing was divided into two groups. The first group consisted of sequences containing positive and negative errors in the spectrum, at a rate of up to 20%, excluding errors coming from repetitions. The second group consisted of sequences containing repeated oligonucleotides, and containing additional errors up to 5% added into the spectra. Our new method outperforms the best alternative procedures for both data sets. Moreover, the method produces solutions exhibiting extremely high degree of similarity to the target sequences in the cases without repetitions, which is an important outcome for biologists. The spectra prepared from the sequences taken from GenBank are available on our website http://bio.cs.put.poznan.pl/.     

Hybrid Flow-Shop: a Memetic Algorithm Using Constraint-Based Scheduling for Efficient Search

The paper considers the hybrid flow-shop scheduling problem with multiprocessor tasks. Motivated by the computational complexity of the problem, we propose a memetic algorithm for this problem in the paper. We first describe the implementation details of a genetic algorithm, which is used in the memetic algorithm. We then propose a constraint programming based branch-and-bound algorithm to be employed as the local search engine of the memetic algorithm. Next, we present the new memetic algorithm. We lastly explain the computational experiments carried out to evaluate the performance of three algorithms (genetic algorithm, constraint programming based branch-and-bound algorithm, and memetic algorithm) in terms of both the quality of the solutions produced and the efficiency. These results demonstrate that the memetic algorithm produces better quality solutions and that it is very efficient.     

Metabolomics and Physiological Insights into the Ability of Exogenously Applied Chlorogenic Acid and Hesperidin to Modulate Salt Stress in Lettuce Distinctively

Recent studies in the agronomic field indicate that the exogenous application of polyphenols can provide tolerance against various stresses in plants. However, the molecular processes underlying stress mitigation remain unclear, and little is known about the impact of exogenously applied phenolics, especially in combination with salinity. In this work, the impacts of exogenously applied chlorogenic acid (CA), hesperidin (HES), and their combination (HES + CA) have been investigated in lettuce (Lactuca sativa L.) through untargeted metabolomics to evaluate mitigation effects against salinity. Growth parameters, physiological measurements, leaf relative water content, and osmotic potential as well as gas exchange parameters were also measured. As expected, salinity produced a significant decline in the physiological and biochemical parameters of lettuce. However, the treatments with exogenous phenolics, particularly HES and HES + CA, allowed lettuce to cope with salt stress condition. Interestingly, the treatments triggered a broad metabolic reprogramming that involved secondary metabolism and small molecules such as electron carriers, enzyme cofactors, and vitamins. Under salinity conditions, CA and HES + CA distinctively elicited secondary metabolism, nitrogen-containing compounds, osmoprotectants, and polyamines.     

Evaluation of the thermodynamic parameters for the adsorption of some hydrocarbons on alumina and molecular sieves 3A and 5A by inverse gas chromatography

Inverse gas chromatography has been used to evaluate the adsorption parameters (deltaH, deltaS and deltaG) of some probes, each representing a class of organic compounds (n-hexane, cyclohexane and benzene) on some adsorbents (activated alumina, and molecular sieves 3A and 5A). It was found that benzene exhibits more negative deltaH than for n-hexane and cyclohexane on molecular sieves 3A and 5A and alumina. Also, interactions of the benzene with molecular sieves 3A and 5A were found to be stronger than that on alumina. On the contrary, interactions of the hexane with alumina were found to be stronger than those on molecular sieves 3A and 5A.     

Minimizing Weighted Number of Early and Tardy Jobs with a Common Due Window Involving Location Penalty

This paper studies a single machine scheduling problem to minimize the weighted number of early and tardy jobs with a common due window. There are n non-preemptive and simultaneously available jobs. Each job will incur an early (tardy) penalty if it is early (tardy) with respect to the common due window under a given schedule. The window size is a given parameter but the window location is a decision variable. The objective of the problem is to find a schedule that minimizes the weighted number of early and tardy jobs and the location penalty. We show that the problem is NP-complete in the ordinary sense and develop a dynamic programming based pseudo-polynomial algorithm. We conduct computational experiments, the results of which show that the performance of the dynamic algorithm is very good in terms of memory requirement and CPU time. We also provide polynomial time algorithms for two special cases.