UPLC-ELSD Determination of 1-Octacosanol in Raw Material and Health Products

Determination of the levels of 1-octacosanol is important in food stuff for the study of its pharmacological activities and health benefits. In this study, a novel, simple and fast internal standard method for the non-derivatization ultra-performance liquid chromatographic determination of 1-octacosanol in raw materials and health products was developed and validated based on evaporative light scattering detection. The linearity (r ² > 0.998), recovery (99.1–100.2%, RSD <2.7%), intra- and inter-day precision (RSD <3.8%), limit of detection (1.0 mg/L), limit of quantification (2.2 mg/L) of the 1-octacosanol were determined. The method was successfully applied to nine real 1-octacosanol products. The results of analyses had close agreement with the labeled claims of 1-octacosanol content in these products. Compared with the classical gas chromatography method, the developed method was simpler, faster and more environmentally friendly due to avoiding any derivatization step. This protocol represents a rapid and feasible method for quality control of 1-octacosanol products.

     

Sortase-Mediated Transpeptidation for Site-Specific Modification of Peptides, Glycopeptides, and Proteins

Sortases are a family of transpeptidases found in Gram-positive bacteria responsible for covalent anchoring of cell surface proteins to bacterial cell walls. It has been discovered that sortase A (SrtA) of Staphylococcus aureus origin is rather promiscuous and can accept various molecules as substrates. As a result, SrtA has been widely used to ligate peptides and proteins with a variety of nucleophiles, and the ligation products are useful for research in chemical biology, proteomics, biomedicine, etc. This review summarizes the recent applications of SrtA with special emphasis on SrtA-catalyzed ligation of carbohydrates with peptides and proteins.     

Copper‐catalyzed Clauson–Kass pyrroles synthesis in aqueous media

An efficient and convenient copper‐catalyzed Clauson–Kass reaction of 2,5‐dimethoxytetrahydrofuran with amines in aqueous media has been developed, providing a wide range of N‐substituted pyrroles in good yields. It is noteworthy that the Clauson–Kass reaction of 2,5‐dimethoxytetrahydrofuran with p‐phenylenediamine or m‐phenylenediamine proceeds smoothly to afford the corresponding monopyrroles and bispyrroles with high selectivity in impressive yields. A plausible mechanism for the formation of N‐substituted pyrroles has been proposed. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Copolymerization of styrene and norbornene with β‐diketiminato nickel/methylaluminoxane catalytic system

Styrene–norbornene (S‐N) copolymerizations were carried out using β‐diketiminato nickel complexes CH{C(CF₃)NAr}₂NiBr (Ar = 2,6‐ⁱPr₂C₆H₃, 1 ; Ar = 2,6‐Me₂C₆H₃, 2 ) in the presence of methylaluminoxane. The influence of the comonomer feed content and polymerization temperature on the conversion and composition of the copolymers with the catalytic system was investigated. An increase in the feed ratio of S/N led to an increase in the incorporated styrene content of the resulting copolymer. NMR characterization of the copolymers generated with the catalytic systems showed that the random S‐N copolymers are produced. Differential scanning calorimetric determination of the copolymers shows higher T_g values than polystyrene, and gel permeation chromatographic measurements have shown that the copolymers possess rather narrow molecular weight distributions, suggesting that the copolymerization take place at a single active site. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Turing structures and stability for the 1-D Lengyel–Epstein system

This paper continues the analysis on the Lengyel–Epstein reaction- diffusion system of the chlorite-iodide-malonic acid-starch (CIMA) reaction for the rich Turing structures. The steady state structures, especially the double bifurcation one, and their stability and multiplicity are studied by the use of Lyapunov–Schmidt reduction technique and singularity theory. Numerical simulations are presented to support our theoretical studies. The results show that the richer stationary Turing patterns heavily rely both on the size of the reactor and on the effective diffusion rate in the CIMA reaction.     

Cyclopalladated ferrocenylimine as an efficient catalyst for the syntheses of diarylmethane derivatives

The cyclopalladated ferrocenylimine adducts Ia , Ib , Ic were evaluated in the Suzuki cross‐coupling reaction of benzyl halides with arylboronic acids. The tricyclohexylphosphine adduct Ia exhibited highly catalytic activity for the coupling of aryl and heteroaryl boronic acids containing various functional groups with benzylic bromides and chlorides (up to 99% yield), furnishing diarylmethane derivatives with low catalyst loading (1 mol%). It is worth noting that catalyst Ia can be reused eight times without losing its catalytic activity. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.