Monitoring the Aggregation of Dansyl Chloride in Acetone through Fluorescence Measurements

The aggregation of dansyl chloride (DNS-Cl) in acetone has been studied in detail by steady-state fluorescence techniques.It has been demonstrated that DNS-Cl is stable in acetone during purification and aggregation study processes.The aggregates are not solvolyzed in acetone,and do not take part n any chemical reactions either.It has been found that DNS-Cl tends to aggregate even when its concentration is much lower than its solubility in acetone.The aggregation is reversible,and both the aggregation and the deaggregation are very slow processes.Introduction of SDS has a positive effect upon the formation and stabilization of the aggregates.     

Dendritic Macroinitiator for the Ring—Opening Polymerization of γ—Benzyl L—Glutamate N—Carboxyanhydride

Much effort has been dedicated to the molecular design and synthesis of model proteins to define protein folding interactions and to develop protein-based materials. Among them, the ring-opening polymerization of -amino acid-N-carboxyanhy- drides (NCAs) has drawn much attention because the resulting artificial polypeptides have wide applications in biotechnology, biomineralization and diagnostics1, 2. It is well known that dendrimers are hyperbranched macromolecules possessing a very high co…     

SCATTERING FUNCTION OF POLYMER BLENDS

For a system of flexible polymer molecules, the concepts of two concentrations, namely the segmental and the molecular concentrations, have been proposed in this paper. The former is equivalent to the volume fraction. The latter can be defined as the number of the gravity centers of macromolecules in a unit volume. The two concentrations should be correlated with each other by the conformational function of the polymer chain and should be discussed in different thermodynamic equations. On the basis of these concepts it has been proved that the Flory-Huggins entropy of mixing should be the result of the mixing “ideal gases of the gravity centers of macromolecules“. The general correlation between the free energy of mixing and the scattering function (structural factor) of polymer blends has been studied based on the general fluctuation theory. When the Flory-Huggins free energy of mixing is adopted, the de Gennes scattering function of a polymer blend can be derived.     

Evidence of DNA-Ligand Binding with Different Modes Studied by Spectroscopy

The study of DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) conformational changes upon ligand bindingis a hot spot in the frontier field of relative research in chemical biological or medicinalareas,1-5. The structual changes of DNA in response to ifferent bound ligands haveattracted continuing at'tention in the medicinal design of anticancer and/or anti-AIDSdrugs. TO fuFther reveal the relationship between the specially functional structure ofligands and the conformational changes of DNA, the binding mod…     

A Study of Relationship Between Universality in Fractal Colloids Aggregation and Time-dependent SERS

The relationship between the rule of time-dependent surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) intensity of adsorbed pyridine in AgBr sol and silver bromide colloidal fractal aggregation is studied in this paper. The experimental results support the view of universality in colloidal aggregation and suggest that SERS may be a useful tool in the study of kinetics of colloidal aggregation.     

Effects of additives on the aggregation of surfactants: binding domination

The effects of electrolytes, alcohols, and urea on the aggregation of SDS, CTAB, and TritonX-100 at 25℃ have been investigated by fluorescence probing of pyrene. Both electrolytes and alcoholsreduce the critical micelle concentration (CMC) of the ionic surfactants, while the effect of the former ismore pronounced. It is shown that the effects of electrolytes mainly depend on the concentrationsand especially the valence of the opposite charge ions, and only slightly depend on the same charge ionsin respect of ion aggregate of micelle. The logarithm of CMC is not linearly correlated with theconcentrations of the counter ion or the electrolytes. The results are rationalized in terms of Hartley'smodel. Propanol increases the CMC of TX-100, while electrolytes and urea do not. In all the threekinds of surfactant micelles the excitation spectrum of pyrene slightly red-shifts (ca. 4 nm) from thatin water, but is not affected by the additives. The micropolarity of the environment in which pyrenemolecule resides in SDS micelle decreases with the increase of the concentrations of electrolytes. Thisis not the case when alcohols and urea were added to SDS or to TX-100. It is suggested that theaddition of electrolytes would result in more orderly orientation of SDS molecules. It is the bindingstrength of the counter ions that dominates the effects of additives on the aggregation of surfactants.     

Kinetic studies on the aggregation behavior of phosphatidylcholines and their analogs

Phosphatidylcholines (Ln's) and their neutral analogs 1,2-diacyl-sn-glycerol-3-phospho-ric acid bromoethyl esters (Pn's) have been found to exhibit different aggregation behaviors brought about by hydrophobic-lipophilic interactions (HLI) by means of kinetic probe in MeOH-H2O binary aquiorganic systems. The effects of the structure and the environment on the interesting aggregation of the amphiphilic molecules are discussed.     

Effect of Concentration of Structurally-Different Carboxylic Acids on Growth and Aggregation of Calcium Oxalate in Gel Systems

The effect of concentration of structurally-different carboxylic acids such as ethylene diamine tetraacetic acid （H4edta）, citric acid （H3cit）, tartaric acid （H2tart）, and acetic acid （HOAc） on growth and aggregation of calcium oxalate （CaOxa） in gel systems was comparatively investigated. H2tart and H3cit could change the morphology of cal- cium oxalate monohydrate （COM） and induce the formation of calcium oxalate dihydrate （COD）. H4edta could induce the formation of COD at a lower concentration of 0.33 mmol/L and have the strongest ability to inhibit aggregation of COM. HOAc inhibited COM aggregation only at a higher concentration than 500 mmol/L. With increasing the number of carboxylic groups in an acid or increasing the concentration of carboxylic acid, the capacity of this acid to induce COD formation and to inhibit growth and aggregation of COM crystals increased. That is, this capacity followed the order： H4edta〉H3cit〉H2tart〉 〉HOAc. The result in this work suggested that the presence of H3cit and H2tart in urine played a role in the natural defense against stone formation.     

Structural Transition Dynamics in Carbon Electrode-Based Single-Molecule Junctions

Monitoring the structural transitions of individual molecules is of great significance because it helps to in depth explore the properties of molecules and provide diverse possibilities for molecular applications in the fields of chemistry,biology and material science.This review summarizes the strategy of using single-molecule electrical approaches to study molecular structure transitions at the single-molecule level in real time.Specifically,through the use of stable single-molecule devices for real-time electrical monitoring,the process of molecular structure transitions of a single molecule can be investigated,which helps to explore the nature of molecules in chemical and biological systems.In particular,the detection methods have been extended to the investigation of biological macromolecules for monitoring the conformational changes of nucleotide chains in different systems,such as double helix DNA,aptamer and DNA enzyme.In the end,we discuss the future challenges of probing structural transitions of single molecules,and provide prospects for further breakthroughs in this field.     

Aggregation of the Adsorbed Proteins—in Solution or on the Surface？

The adsorption of bovine serum albumin(BSA) on porous polyethylene(PE) membrane was studied based on adsorption and desorption measurements as well as FTIR analysis. A different mechanism was roposed which showed that a critical concentration existed in the adsorptional process. Below this concentration, the adsorption seems to be conducted in a normal side-on way; above this concentration,the adsorption is in an aggregation way.     

Thermal-induced Unfolding of β-Crystallin and Disassembly of its Oligomers Revealed by Temperature-Jump Time-Resolved Infrared Spectroscopy

β-Crystallins are the major structural proteins existing in the vertebrate lens, and their conformational stability is critical in maintaining the life-long transparency and refraction index of the lens. Seven subunits of β-crystallins naturally assemble into various heteroge- neous oligomers with different sizes. Here, we systematically investigated the thermal sta- bility of the different secondary structures present in β-Crystallins and then the dynamic process for the thermal-induced unfolding of β-crystallins by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy-monitored thermal titration and temperature-jump nanosecond time-resolved IR difference absorbance spectra. Our results show that the N-terminal anti-parallel β-sheets in β-crystallin are the most unstable with a transition midpoint temperature at 36.0-2.1℃, leading to the formation of an intermediate consisting vastly of random coil structures. This intermediate structure is temporally assigned to that of the monomer generated by the thermal-induced disassembly of β-crystallin oligomers with a transition midpoint tempera- ture of 40.4-0.7℃. The global unfolding of β-crystallins that leads to denaturation and aggregation indicated by the formation of intermolecular anti-parallel β-sheets has a transi- tion midpoint temperature determined as 72.4-0.2 ℃. Temperature-jump time-resolved IR absorbance difference spectroscopy analysis further reveals that thermal-induced unfolding of β-crystallins occurs firstly in the anti-parallel β-sheets in the N-terminal domains with a time constant of 50 ns.     

Theoretical study on conformational conversion of 1,3-dioxane inside a capsular host

The conformational conversion of 1,3-dioxane guest encapsulated inside a cylindrical capsular host was investigated with PM3 method and single point energies were evaluated by B3LYP method. When entrapped in the capsule, the guest tumbles were slower than that in the free condition. The influences of the inner phase of the capsule on the guest conformational conversion were discussed in detail.     

Cholesterol modulating the orientation of His17 in hepatitis C virus p7 (5a) viroporin——A molecular dynamic simulation study

The cholesterol molecules interact with p7 channel between the adjoint H3 helixes, resulting in prominent conformational changes of these helical segments, which further exerts influence on the His17 residues of i + 2 monomer, leading to the residues facing towards to the lumen of the pore. Such side chain orientations of His17 are considered to be essential for the channel’s ionic selectivity and gating.     

Fabrication of rod-shaped β-FeOOH: the roles of polyethylene glycol and chlorine anion

β-FeOOH nanorods of 40 nm wide and 450 nm long were fabricated through precisely regulating the hydrolysis kinetics of Fe~(3+) in polyethylene glycol and the concentration of Cl~- as the structure-directing agent. Detailed structural and chemical analyses of the intermediates during the synthesis identified that the strong interaction between PEG and Fe~(3+) modulated the hydrolysis kinetics of Fe~(3+) and prevented the aggregation of β-FeOOH nanorods; while Cl~- provided sufficient nucleation sites, stabilized the hollow channel of β-FeOOH, and more importantly induced the growth of the nanorods along [001] direction.     

Treatment of Alzheimer's disease with small-molecule photosensitizers

Alzheimer’s disease is a neurodegenerative disease that signals for excess β-amyloid(Aβ) aggregation.Although people have made great attempts to control the aggregation of Aβ, no effective medications have been produced yet. Due to its excellent temporal and spatial selectivity, photodynamic treatment has been gradually employed and interfered in the aggregation process of Aβ, with some achievement. To enhance the research and application of photodynamic therapy in Alzheimer’s disease, this pape...     

Aggregation of graphene oxide and its environmental implications in the aquatic environment

Graphene oxide(GO) with unique characteristics grasps striking potentials in both academic and industrial applications. After being released into natural waters, the dispersity and stability of GO might be altered by the chemical conditions in the receiving water bodies. In this review, we summarized that the aggregation of GO in aquatic environments is mostly dependent on properties of nanoparticles(size,structure, and functional groups) and complex water chemistry(p H, temperature, light, ioni...     

Temperature effect on the ease of aggregation

The effect of temperature on the critical aggregate concentration (CAgC) has been investigated for the first time, by measurement of the hydrolytic rate constants of p-nitrophenyl dodecanoate (C12) and hexadecanoate (C16) at different temperatures in the 30:70 V/V (Φ=0.30) and 40:60 V/V (Φ= 0.40) dioxane (DX)-H2O systems. The CAgC values of C12 and C16 increase with the increase of the temperature, i.e., high temperatures disfavor aggregation. Activation energies for the hydrolysis of C12 in the monomeric and aggregated concentration domains have also been discussed.     

The Chemical Speciation and Behavior of Mercury and Selenium in the Insoluble Fraction of Striped Dolphin Liver

Most of the mercury and selenium exist in the insoluble fraction of dolphin liver. After the insoluble fraction was digested by alkaline protease in the presence of 1% SDS, approximately 50% of Hg and Se consisted in the supernatant and the others in the residue. Gel filtration chromatography of the hydrolysate showed that 96% of Hg and 87% of Se were combined with the high molecular weight proteins stably, which cannot be substituted by the complex reagents.Mercury and selenium in the residue were confirmed as HgSe crystal.     

Molecular dynamics simulation of the A-DNA to B-DNA transition in aqueous RbCl solution

Unrestrained molecular dynamics (MD) simulations have been carried out to characterize the stability of DNA conformations and the dynamics of A-DNA→B-DNA conformational transitions in aqueous RbCl solutions. The PARM99 force field in the AMBER8 package was used to investigate the effect of RbCl concentration on the dynamics of the A→B conformational transition in the DNA duplex d(CGCGAATTCGCG)2 . Canonical Aand B-form DNA were assumed for the initial conformation and the final conformation had a length per complete turn that matched the canonical B-DNA. The DNA structure was monitored for 3.0 ns and the distances between the C5′ atoms were obtained from the simulations. It was found that all of the double stranded DNA strands of A-DNA converged to the structure of B-form DNA within 1.0 ns during the unrestrained MD simulations. In addition, increasing the RbCl concentration in aqueous solution hindered the A→B conformational transition and the transition in aqueous RbCl solution was faster than that in aqueous NaCl solution for the same electrolyte strength. The effects of the types and concentrations of counterions on the dynamics of the A→B conformational transition can be understood in terms of the variation in water activity and the number of accumulated counterions in the major grooves of A-DNA. The rubidium ion distributions around both fixed A-DNA and B-DNA were obtained using the restrained MD simulations to help explain the effect of RbCl concentration on the dynamics of the A→B conformational transition.     

Electric Field-induced Conformational Transition of Bovine Serum Albumin from α-helix to β-sheet

The conformational change of a biomolecule plays an important role in biologicalactivity. Electric field induced conformational transitions of helix-coil have beenreported for the proteins directly exposed to a high electric field, which is the results ofelectric birefringence and the electrooptical Kerr effectsl'2. The adsorbed proteins atelectrode interfaces3,4 also show conformational changes. One of the reasons for this isthat electric double layer near electrode surface offers a very stro…