Critical Assessment of the DFT + U Approach for the Prediction of Vanadium Dioxide Properties

In a previous study (Stahl and Bredow, Chem. Phys. Lett. 2018, 695, 28–33), we have studied structural, energetic, and electronic properties of two vanadium dioxide VO₂ polymorphs with modified global and range-separated hybrid functionals. Since hybrid methods are computationally demanding, we evaluate the computationally more efficient DFT + U method in the present study. We assessed the widely used Dudarev PBE + U approach with a literature value of the effective Hubbard parameter U_eff = 3.4 eV. We compared the PBE + U results for the two VO₂ polymorphs with our previous results, a self-consistent hybrid functional sc-PBE0, and the meta-GGA functional SCAN. It was found that the PBE + U method yields a strongly distorted monoclinic phase and does not reproduce the metal-to-insulator transition of VO₂ correctly, even with modified values of U_eff. On the other hand, sc-PBE0 and SCAN describe the relative stability and the electronic structure of both polymorphs correctly and also provide reasonable lattice parameters. The functional SCAN yields the optimal balance between computational efficiency and accuracy. © 2019 The Authors. Journal of Computational Chemistry published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Automated De Novo Drug Design: Are We Nearly There Yet?

Medicinal chemistry and, in particular, drug design have often been perceived as more of an art than a science. The many unknowns of human disease and the sheer complexity of chemical space render decision making in medicinal chemistry exceptionally demanding. Computational models can assist the medicinal chemist in this endeavour. Provided here is an overview of recent examples of automated de novo molecular design, a discussion of the concepts and computational approaches involved, and the daring prediction of some of the possibilities and limitations of drug design using machine intelligence.     

Are Fulleranes Responsible for the 21 Micron Feature?

Recent detections of C\begin{document}$ _{60} $\end{document}, C\begin{document}$ _{70} $\end{document}, and C\begin{document}$ _{60} $\end{document}\begin{document}$ ^+ $\end{document} in space induced extensive studies of fullerene derivatives in circumstellar environments. As the promising fullerene sources, protoplanetary nebulae (PPNe) shows a number of unidentified bands in their infrared spectra, among which a small sample exhibits an enigmatic feature at \begin{document}$ \sim $\end{document}21 \begin{document}$ \mathtt{μ} $\end{document}m. Hydrogenation converts fullerenes into fulleranes, which breaks the symmetry of fullerene molecules and produces new infrared bands. In this work, we investigate the possibility of fulleranes (C\begin{document}$ _{60} $\end{document}H\begin{document}$ _m $\end{document}) as the carrier of the 21 \begin{document}$ \mathtt{μ} $\end{document}m feature in terms of theoretical vibrational spectra of fulleranes. The evidences favoring and disfavoring the fullerane hypothesis are presented. We made an initial guess for the hydrogen coverage of C\begin{document}$ _{60} $\end{document}H\begin{document}$ _m $\end{document} that may contribute to the 21 \begin{document}$ \mathtt{μ} $\end{document}m feature.     

Are intermediate electronic states responsible for pyroelectric luminescence?

Patel and Hanson have observed discrete spectrum-like spontaneous luminescence of, and simultaneous current flow through, certain organic and ionic crystals when they were either cooled or heated at a constant rate. The hypothetical intermediate electronic states (neither bulk nor localized-type) are thought to be responsible for this effect. By the “turning over process”, these states can transport a definite quantity of electric charge through the crystal for special discrete (size, shape, surface contamination, temperature and pressure dependent) boundary conditions, even if the crystal is a semiconductor or insulator.     

Hybrid Drugs—A Strategy for Overcoming Anticancer Drug Resistance?

Despite enormous progress in the treatment of many malignancies, the development of cancer resistance is still an important reason for cancer chemotherapy failure. Increasing knowledge of cancers’ molecular complexity and mechanisms of their resistance to anticancer drugs, as well as extensive clinical experience, indicate that an effective fight against cancer requires a multidimensional approach. Multi-target chemotherapy may be achieved using drugs combination, co-delivery of medicines, or designing hybrid drugs. Hybrid drugs simultaneously targeting many points of signaling networks and various structures within a cancer cell have been extensively explored in recent years. The single hybrid agent can modulate multiple targets involved in cancer cell proliferation, possesses a simpler pharmacokinetic profile to reduce the possibility of drug interactions occurrence, and facilitates the process of drug development. Moreover, a single medication is expected to enhance patient compliance due to a less complicated treatment regimen, as well as a diminished number of adverse reactions and toxicity in comparison to a combination of drugs. As a consequence, many efforts have been made to design hybrid molecules of different chemical structures and functions as a means to circumvent drug resistance. The enormous number of studies in this field encouraged us to review the available literature and present selected research results highlighting the possible role of hybrid drugs in overcoming cancer drug resistance.     

Prediction of affinities of peptides for calmodulin

A simple method has been developed to predict the calmodulin-binding domains of peptides and the affinities of the peptides for calmodulin based on a model for the calmodulin-binding domains of peptides proposed in a previous paper and the literature data of calmodulin-binding peptides. The effects of hydrophobitities, α-helix-forming tendencies, and basicities of peptides on their affinities for calmodulin were studied. Model peptides were designed to examine the calmodulin-binding domain model and the prediction method. The determined dissociation constants of the complexes formed from the model peptides and calmodulin are in good agreement with the predicted results.     

Commentary On “Extended Hildebrand Approach: An Empirical Model for Solubility Prediction of Etodolac in 1,4-Dioxane and Water Mixtures”

Several mathematical errors in the published paper by Rathi and Deshpande (J Solution Chem 43:1886–1903, 2014) are identified. The errors concern the incorrect conversion of mass fraction to volume fraction concentrations of 1,4-dioxane, the incorrect conversion of mole fraction solubilities to molar solubilities of Etodolac, and the incorrect calculation of the ideal mole fraction solubility of Etodolac.     

Determination of Critical Parameters of Carbon Dioxide ＋ Butyraldehyde System with Different Compositions

Supercritical carbon dioxide（SC-CO2 ） is considered in green chemistry as a substitute for conventional solvents in chemical reactions due to its environmentally benign character. Recently we have reported the homogeneous hydroformylation of propylene in supercritical carbon dioxide（ SC-CO2 ） , which is an example of this kind of application of carbon dioxide. The determination for the critical parameters of carbon dioxide ＋ butyraldehyde mixtures is necessary for this reaction design which is the focus of the present paper. The critical parameters of the binary systems were determined via the static visual method at a constant volume with the molar fraction of butyraldehyde ranging from 1.0% to 2. 2% and the pressure ranging from 5 to 10 MPa. The experimental results show that the critical pressure and temperature increased with increasing the molar fraction of butyraldehyde. The bubble（dew） temperatures and the bubble （dew） pressures for the binary systems were also determined experimentally. The p-T Figures at different compositions of the binary systems were described. In addition, the critical compressibility factors Zc of the binary systems at different concentrations of n-butyraldehyde were calculated. It was found that the critical compressibility factor values of the binary systems decreased with increasing the molar fraction of n-butyraldehyde in the experimental range.     

Are deterministic expert systems for computer-assisted structure elucidation obsolete?

Expert systems for spectroscopic molecular structure elucidation have been developed since the mid-1960s. Algorithms associated with the structure generation process within these systems are deterministic; that is, they are based on graph theory and combinatorial analysis. A series of expert systems utilizing 2D NMR spectra have been described in the literature and are capable of determining the molecular structures of large organic molecules including complex natural products. Recently, an opinion was expressed in the literature that these systems would fail when elucidating structures containing more than 30 heavy atoms. A suggestion was put forward that stochastic algorithms for structure generation would be necessary to overcome this shortcoming. In this article, we describe a comprehensive investigation of the capabilities of the deterministic expert system Structure Elucidator. The results of performing the structure elucidation of 250 complex natural products with this program were studied and generalized. The conclusion is that 2D NMR deterministic expert systems are certainly capable of elucidating large structures (up to about 100 heavy atoms) and can deal with the complexities associated with both poor and contradictory spectral data.     

Progress in Molecular Dynamics and Hansen Solubility Parameters of Low Molecular Weight Gels北大核心CSCD

Recently,the use of computational methods such as Molecular Dynamics（MD）simulations and Hansen Solubility Parameters （HSPs）to study the behavior of small molecule gelators has attracted much attention. MD simulation is a computational method based on classical mechanics and is one of the preferred techniques for understanding the process of small molecule gelators. The MD simulation can more accurately analyze the gelation trend or assembly behavior of small molecule gelators,dynamically and graphically display the self-assembly process,effectively reveal the relationship between the structure of small molecule gelators and related gelation behavior,and quantitatively analyze non-covalent bond interactions such as hydrogen bonds,π-π stacking,van der Waals interactions,ionic bonding and solvophobic interactions. By performing molecular dynamics simulations on known gelators/non-gelators,parameters related to gelation behavior in the simulated data are extracted,and the linear correlation is measured by fitting the Pearson correlation coefficient to finally predict the gelation behavior of a certain class of small molecules. On the other hand,the empirical model developed according to the HSPs is the most representative,which consists of the energy of dispersion interaction（δd）,the energy of polar interaction（δp）and H-bonding energy（δh ）between molecules. These three parts determine the coordinate point of the three-dimensional space（Hansen space）. According to the range of the point,it can be determined whether the organic small molecule can form a gel in a specific solvent. In this paper,representative works published recently in the field of organic small molecule gels by using MD simulations and empirical models are reviewed. Some comments on the assembly behavior of gelators,the regulation and prediction of non-covalent bond interactions on gelation ability are made. © 2022, Science Press (China). All rights reserved.     

Are carbodiphosphoranes better ligands than N-heterocyclic carbenes for Grubb's catalysts?

Theoretical investigations suggest that substitution of an N-heterocyclic carbene by a carbodiphosphorane in the Grubb's catalyst for olefin metathesis might lead to enhanced reactivity.     

Analysis of Human Blood Plasma by MALDI‐TOF MS—Evaluation of Critical Parameters

Abstract

Matrix‐assisted laser desorption and ionization time‐of‐flight (MALDI‐TOF) mass spectrometry (MS) was used to evaluate the lipid composition of human blood plasma. The focus was on parameters affecting the spectral quality: The laser intensity had the highest impact and must be set as low as possible. Additionally, salt removal by lipid extraction led to an enhanced reproducibility. Surprisingly, the influence of storage time of a given plasma sample was only weak.

It will be shown that the lipid MALDI‐TOF mass spectra allow the differentiation of nutrition habits. The comparison between vegetarians and normal volunteers indicated a higher phosphatidylcholine to triacylglycerol and phosphatidylcholine to lysophosphatidylcholine ratio in the plasma of the vegetarians.     

A New Model for Correlating the Solubility of Solids in Supercritical CO_2 and Study on Some Systems(Ⅱ): Correlation and Prediction

Inthepreviouspaper',wedevelopedanewmodelforcorrelatingandpredictingthesolubilitiesofsolidsinsupercriticalfluids(SCFs),whichcanbegiveninthefollowingformin[yi/(l-"y,)]=njnon(RTdr)-'dp-inP BP C(l)wherethecoefficientofthepressuretermisgivenbyB=-n(RTd,')-,(2)InEqs(1)and(2),yZisthemolefractionofthesoluteinSCFphase,d.thebulkdensityofthesolvent,d,'thelocaldensityofthesolventsurroundingthesolute,Tabsollltetemperatllre,Ppressure,Rgasconstallt,andCconstant.Thevalidityofamodelshouldbeverifiedbycor…