Simultaneous determination of terpenes and cannabidiol in hemp (Cannabis sativa L.) by fast gas chromatography with flame ionization detection

Hemp (Cannabis sativa L.) has become widely used in several sectors due to the presence of various bioactive compounds such as terpenes and cannabidiol. In general, terpenes and cannabidiol content is determined separately, which is time consuming. Thus, a fast gas chromatography with flame ionization detection method was validated for simultaneous determination of both terpenes and cannabidiol in hemp. The method enabled a rapid detection of 29 different terpenes and cannabidiol within a total analysis time of 16 min, with satisfactory sensitivity (limit of detection = 0.03–0.27 µg/mL, limit of quantitation = 0.10–0.89 µg/mL). The inter‐ and intraday precision (RSD) was <7.82 and <3.59%, respectively. Recoveries at two spiked concentration levels (low, 3.15 µg/mL; high, 20.0 µg/mL) were determined on both apical leaves (78.55–101.52%) and inflorescences (77.52–107.10%). The reproducibility (RSD) was <5.94 and <5.51% in apical leaves and inflorescences, respectively. The proposed and validated method is highly sensitive, robust, fast, and accurate for determination of the main terpenes and cannabidiol in hemp and could be routinely used for quality control.     

Ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid (EDTA) as an auxiliary tool in the electrospray ionization mass spectrometry analysis of native and derivatized β-cyclodextrins,maltoses, and fructans contaminated with Ca and/or Mg

The effect of Ca²⁺ (and Mg²⁺) and the disodium salt of ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid (EDTA), a well known Ca²⁺ (and Mg²⁺) chelating agent, on the volatilization/ionization of carbohydrates by using electrospray ionization mass spectrometry has been studied. Model compounds such as maltoses (maltose to maltoheptaose), β-cyclodextrins (β-cyclodextrin, methyl-β-cyclodextrin, heptakis(2,6-di-O-methyl)-β-cyclodextrin, heptakis(2,3,6-tri-O-methyl)-β-cyclodextrin, and 2-hydroxypropyl-β-cyclodextrin) and fructans (sucrose, 1-ketose, nystose, and 1F-fructofuranosylnystose) were used.     

Fabrication and characterization of freestanding ultrathin diamond-like carbon targets for high-intensity laser applications

Here, we report the fabrication of diamond-like carbon (DLC) thin films using pulsed laser deposition (PLD). PLD is a well-established technique for deposition of high-quality DLC thin films. Carbon tape target was ablated using a KrF (248 nm, 25 ns, 20 Hz) excimer laser to deposit DLC films on soap-coated substrates. A laser fluence between 8.5 and 14 J/cm² and a target to substrate distance of 10 cm was used. These films were then released from substrates to obtain freestanding DLC thin foils. Foil thicknesses from 20 to 200 nm were deposited using this technique to obtain freestanding targets of up to 1-inch square area. Typically, 100-nm-thick freestanding DLC films were characterized using different techniques such as AFM, XPS, and nano-indentation. AFM was used to obtain the film surface roughness of 9 nm rms of the released film. XPS was utilized to obtain 74 % sp², 23 % sp³, and 3 % C–O bond components. Nano-indentation was used to characterize the film hardness of 10 GPa and Young’s modulus of 110 GPa. Damage threshold properties of the DLC foils were studied (1,064 nm, 6 ns) and found to be 7 × 10¹⁰ W/cm² peak intensity for our best ultrathin DLC foils.     

An Exact Family of Einstein–Maxwell Wyman–Adler Solution in General Relativity

This paper presents a family of two-parametric interior solutions of Einstein–Maxwell field equations in general relativity for a static spherically symmetric distribution of a charged perfect fluid with particular choice of charge distribution and the metric component g ₀₀. This family gives us wide range of parameters, n and K, for which the solutions are regular and acceptable on physical grounds and hence suitable for modeling of charged compact star. The maximum allowable mass and corresponding radius, for this family of solutions with the particular form of charge distribution, is determined to be 2.48M _⊙ and 10.56 km respectively by assuming the stellar “surface” density equal to strange (quark) matter density at zero pressure. It is hoped that our investigation may be of some importance in connection with the study of internal structure of electrically charged strange (quark) star.     

Some Exact Relativistic Models of Electrically Charged Self-bound Stars

In continuation of recent work done by the present authors (Int. J. Theor. Phys. 2013, doi:10.1007/s10773-013-1538-y, hereafter paper I) some new exact families of static spherically symmetric perfect fluid solution of Einstein–Maxwell gravitational field equations are presented. These solutions and the corresponding equations of state, presented in parametric form, may be astrophysically significant in constructing relativistic stellar models of electrically charged self-bound stars.     

Toluene chemiresistor sensor based on nano-porous toluene-imprinted polymer

In this work, the application of molecularly imprinted polymer (MIP) as the recognition element of a chemiresistor sensor was introduced. Toluene-imprinted polymer and non-imprinted polymer (NIP) were synthesized and then mixed with carbon black powder in the presence of melted n-eicosane as the binder agent. The obtained composites were applied for the construction of chemiresistor sensors. The sensor, fabricated with toluene-imprinted polymer, showed a significant response towards toluene. Moreover, the response of the NIP-based (polymer synthesized without solvent) chemiresistor sensor was very small and negligible. The components of the MIP-based sensing composite were found to strongly influence the sensor sensitivity. Response surface experimental design methodology was applied to optimize the important parameters of the proposed sensor. Cross-sensitivity of the MIP-based chemiresistor sensor for different vapours was investigated and a satisfactory result was found for toluene vapour recognition. It was shown that the sensor response to toluene concentration in air was linear in the concentration range of 3.8 to 46.4?ppm. The detection limit and relative standard deviation (for five separate determinations) of the designed sensor were calculated equal to 0.8?ppm and 5.6%, respectively.     

Centrosymmetric [Mn2(CO)6(μ-thpymS)2] (thpymS = tetrahydropyrimidine-2-thionato) as a synthon to mixed-metal clusters

Reaction of [Mn₂(CO)₉(NCMe)] with tetrahydropyrimidine-2-thione (thpymSH) at 25 °C furnishes the mono- and dinuclear complexes [Mn(CO)₄(κ¹:η¹-SCNHC₃H₆NCO)] (2) and [Mn₂(CO)₆(μ-thpymS)₂] (1), respectively. Carbon-nitrogen coupling is observed in compound 2 resulting in the formation of κ¹:η¹-SCNHC₃H₆NCO ligand while compound 1 adopts a centrosymmetric structure. Reaction of 1 with [Os₃(CO)₁₀(NCMe)₂] at 80 °C affords the mixed Mn-Os cluster [MnOs₃(CO)₁₃(μ₃-thpymS)] (3) which possesses a butterfly skeleton of four metal atoms whereas with Ru₃(CO)₁₂ at 110 °C gives the mixed Mn-Ru complex [MnRu₃(CO)₁₄(μ₄-S)(κ¹:η¹-thpym)] (4). In contrast, treatment of 1 with Fe₃(CO)₁₂ at 80 °C furnishes two triiron complexes [Fe₃(CO)₉(μ₃-S)(μ₃-κ¹:η¹-C₄H₆N₂)] (5) and [Fe₃(CO)₈(μ₃-S)₂(η¹-C₄H₈N₂)] (6). The former also results from the direct reaction of thpymSH with Fe₃(CO)₁₂ and reacts with H₂S to afford 6. The molecular structures of all these new complexes have been determined by X-ray diffraction studies.     

Optimization of pulsed laser deposited ZnO thin-film growth parameters for thin-film transistors (TFT) application

In this work we present the optimization of zinc oxide (ZnO) film properties for a thin-film transistor (TFT) application. Thin films, 50±10 nm, of ZnO were deposited by Pulsed Laser Deposition (PLD) under a variety of growth conditions. The oxygen pressure, laser fluence, substrate temperature and annealing conditions were varied as a part of this study. Mobility and carrier concentration were the focus of the optimization. While room-temperature ZnO growths followed by air and oxygen annealing showed improvement in the (002) phase formation with a carrier concentration in the order of 10¹⁷–10¹⁸/cm³ with low mobility in the range of 0.01–0.1 cm²/V?s, a Hall mobility of 8 cm²/V?s and a carrier concentration of 5×10¹⁴/cm³ have been achieved on a relatively low temperature growth (250 °C) of ZnO. The low carrier concentration indicates that the number of defects have been reduced by a magnitude of nearly a 1000 as compared to the room-temperature annealed growths. Also, it was very clearly seen that for the (002) oriented films of ZnO a high mobility film is achieved.