Application of the dissociative electron transfer theory and its extension to the case of in-cage interactions in the electrochemical reduction of arene sulfonyl chlorides

Important aspects of the electrochemical reduction of a series of substituted arene sulfonyl chlorides are investigated. An interesting autocatalytic mechanism is encountered where the starting material is reduced both at the electrode and through homogeneous electron transfer from the resulting sulfinate anion. This is due to the homogenous electron transfer from the two-electron reduction produced anion (arene sulfinate) to the parent arene sulfonyl chloride. As a result, the reduction process and hence the generated final products depend on both the concentration of the substrate and the scan rate. A change is also observed in the reductive cleavage mechanism as a function of the substituent on the phenyl ring of the arene sulfonyl chloride. With 4-cyano and 4-nitrophenyl sulfonyl chlorides a "sticky" dissociative ET mechanism takes place where a concerted ET mechanism leads to the formation of a radical/anion cluster before decomposition. With other substituents (MeO, Me, H, Cl, and F) a "classical" dissociative ET is followed, where the ET and bond cleavage are simultaneous. The dissociative electron transfer theory, as well as its extension to the case of strong in-cage interactions between the produced fragments, along with gas phase chemical quantum calculations results helped us to rationalize both the observed change in the ET mechanism and the occurrence of the "sticky" dissociative ET mechanism. The radical/anion pair interactions have been determined both in solution as well as in the gas phase. The study also shows that despite the low magnitude of in-cage interactions in acetonitrile compared to the gas phase their existence strongly affects the dynamics of the involved reactions. It also shows that, as expected, these interactions are reinforced by the existence of strong electron-withdrawing substituents. The occurrence of an autocatalytic process and the existence of the radical/anion interaction may explain the differences previously observed in the reduction of these compounds in different media.     

Molecular docking study on β-cyclodextrin Interactions of metobromuron and [3-(p-bromophenyl)-1-methoxy-1-methylurea]

The inclusion process involving β-cyclodextrin (β-cyclodextrin-CD) and phenylurea herbicide metobromuron (MB) has been investigated by using the MM+, PM3, B3LYP, HF, ONIOM2 and NBO methods. The binding and complexation energies for both orientations considered in this research are reported. The geometry of the most stable complex shows that the aromatic ring is deeply self-included inside the hydrophobic cavity of β-CD also an intermolecular hydrogen bond is established between host and guest molecules. This suggests that hydrophobic effect and hydrogen bond play an important role in the complexation process. The statistical thermodynamic calculations by PM3 demonstrate that 1:1?MB/β-CD complex is favored by a negative enthalpy change. Moreover, NBO calculations proved also that are a very useful means to quantify the interaction energies of the hydrogen bonds.     

Synthesis and characterization of nanoapatites organofunctionalized with aminotriphosphonate agents

Organofunctionalized apatite nanoparticles were prepared using a one step process involving dissolution/precipitation of natural phosphate rock and covalent grafting of nitrilotris(methylene)triphosphonate (NTP). The synthesized materials were characterized by Brunauer–Emmett–Teller (BET) surface measurement, thermogravimetry, inductively coupled plasma emission spectroscopy (ICP–ES), elemental analysis, multinuclear solid state cross-polarization/magic angle spinning (CP/MAS) and single-pulse NMR spectroscopy, transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and energy dispersive X-ray analysis (EDXA). After grafting BET measurements yielded particle specific surface areas ranging from 88 to 193 m² g^?1 depending on the grafted phosphonate. The results show that the surfaces of the nanoapatite particles can be covered with functional groups bound through a variable number of R–P–O–Ca bonds to render them organoapatites.     

EPR and DFT studies of the structure of phosphinyl radicals complexed by a pentacarbonyl transition metal

Paramagnetic complexes M(CO)5P(C6H5)2, with M = Cr, Mo, W, have been trapped in irradiated crystals of M(CO)5P(C6H5)3 (M = Cr, Mo, W) and M(CO)5PH(C6H5)2 (M = Cr, W) and studied by EPR. The radiolytic scission of a P-C or a P-H bond, responsible for the formation of M(CO)5P(C6H5)2, is consistent with both the number of EPR sites and the crystal structures. The g and 31P hyperfine tensors measured for M(CO)5P(C6H5)2 present some of the characteristics expected for the diphenylphosphinyl radical. However, compared to Ph2P*, the 31P isotropic coupling is larger, the dipolar coupling is smaller, and for Mo and W compounds, the g-anisotropy is more pronounced. These properties are well predicted by DFT calculations. In the optimized structures of M(CO)5P(C6H5)2 (M = Cr, Mo, W), the unpaired electron is mainly confined in a phosphorus p-orbital, which conjugates with the metal d(xz) orbital. The trapped species can be described as a transition metal-coordinated phosphinyl radical.     

Reversed-phase high performance liquid chromatographic method for the determination of lansoprazole, omeprazole and pantoprazole sodium sesquihydrate in presence of their Acid-induced degradation products

A simple sensitive, selective and accurate reversed-phase high performance liquid chromatographic method was developed and validated for the quantitative determination of lansoprazole, omeprazole and pantoprazole sodium sesquishydrate in the presence of their acid-induced degradation products. The three compounds were monitored at 280 nm using Nova-Pak C(18) column and a mobile phase consisting of 0.05 M potassium dihydrogen phosphate : methanol : acetonitrile (5 : 3 : 2 v/v/v). Linearity ranges were 2-20 mug ml(-1), 2-36 mug ml(-1) and 0.5-20 mug ml(-1) for lansoprazole, omeprazole and pantoprazole, respectively. The corresponding recoveries were 100.61+/-0.84%, 100.50+/-0.80% and 99.78+/-0.88%. The minimum detection limits were 0.55, 0.54 and 0.03 mug ml(-1) for lansoprazole, omeprazole and pantoprazole, respectively. The method could be successfully applied to the determination of pure, laboratory prepared mixtures and pharmaceutical dosage forms. The results obtained were compared with the reported methods for lansoprazole and pantoprazole or the official U.S.P method for omeprazole.     

Orthogonal packing of enantiomerically pure helical silver coordination networks

The combination of the chiral tecton based on the (R)-6,6'-dibromo-1,1'-binaphthyl moiety bearing two isonicotinoyl groups with AgX (X = BF4-, CF3SO3-, PF6-) leads to the formation of enantiomerically pure helical strands with orthogonal packing in the rare space group I2(1)3.     

Facile synthesis and characterization of naphthidines as a new class of highly nonplanar electron donors giving robust radical cations

Naphthidines 2 were prepared by nickel-catalyzed amination of 1-chloronaphthalene followed by oxidative homocoupling of 1-naphthalene amines 1 using titanium(IV) tetrachloride. The electronic and magnetic properties of materials 2 were investigated by cyclic voltammetry and other electrochemical techniques, EPR and UV-visible spectroscopies, and magnetic susceptibility. It was demonstrated that compounds 2 could be easily and reversibly oxidized via a two-electron-transfer reaction into their bis(radical cation) 2(2.2+), which displays a substantial stability at room temperature (the half-life of 2(2.2+) estimated by EPR at 25 degrees C was 10 days). B3LYP/6-31G optimized structures of N,N'-bis(4-methoxyphenyl)-(1,1'-binaphthyl)-4,4'-diamine 2g shows significant differences in the torsion angle between the naphthalene moieties depending on its oxidation state. Twisted structures are preferred for neutral compounds, whereas more planar are favored for the oxidized forms 2g*+ and 2g(2.2+) to realize spin and/or charge delocalizations over the whole pi-system. Such conformation changes concerted with the electron transfers contribute to explain the unusual two-electron process observed in the electrochemical behavior of 2g instead of the two single-electron transfers that would have been expected in the case of two successive oxidations. It is finally shown that the oxidation of 2g in CH2Cl2 with thianthrenium perchlorate (ThClO4) generates the dication 2g(2.2+) with singlet spin-multiplicity.     

Conception and Evaluation of a Library of Cleavable Mass Tags for Digital Polymers Sequencing

A library of phosphoramidite monomers containing a main-chain cleavable alkoxyamine and a side-chain substituent of variable molar mass (i.e. mass tag) was prepared in this work. These monomers can be used in automated solid-phase phosphoramidite chemistry and therefore incorporated periodically as spacers inside digitally-encoded poly(phosphodiester) chains. Consequently, the formed polymers contain tagged cleavable sites that guide their fragmentation in mass spectrometry sequencing and enhance their digital readability. The spacers were all prepared via a seven steps synthetic procedure. They were afterwards tested for the synthesis and sequencing of model digital polymers. Uniform digitally-encoded polymers were obtained as major species in all cases, even though some minor defects were sometimes detected. Furthermore, the polymers were decoded in pseudo-MS³ conditions, thus confirming the reliability and versatility of the spacers library.     

Numerical approximation of the optimal control of a population dynamics model

In this paper, we present a numerical approach to an inverse problem of a population dynamics model. We propose a numerical approximation of the optimal control for obtaining the desired observation state using the augmented Lagrangian method. Moreover, the existence and uniqueness of the numerical solutions are mathematically investigated in this work. Finally, we present some numerical experiments to illustrate our theoretical results.