Syntheses,Structures, and Magnetic Properties of Two Cobalt(II) Metal‐Organic Frameworks Based on Y‐shaped 3,5,4′‐Azobenzenetricarboxylic Acid and Different N‐donor Ligands

Two metal‐organic frameworks, [Co₂(ABTC)(bimh)(OH)] · 2H₂O ( 1 ) and [Co₃(ABTC)₂(dimb)₄]_n ( 2 ) [H₃ABTC = 3,4′,5‐azobenzenetricarboxylic acid, bimh = 1,1′‐(1,4‐hexanediy)bis(imidazole), dimb = 1,4‐bis(1H‐imidazol‐1‐yl)benzene], were prepared under solvothermal conditions and structurally characterized. Complex 1 demonstrates a complicated 3D (3,8)‐connected tfz‐d net with (4³)₂(4⁶.6¹⁷.8⁵) topology. The framework of 2 can be classified as a rare 3D (3,6,6)‐connected net with the Schäfli symbol of (4.6²)₂(4².6¹⁰.8³)(4⁴.6¹⁰.8), and exhibits an intriguing self‐penetrating motif. Meanwhile, the thermal stabilities and magnetic properties for 1 and 2 were also probed.     

Incorporation of graphene oxide nanosheets into boronate‐functionalized polymeric monolith to enhance the electrochromatographic separation of small molecules

Graphene oxide (GO) nanosheets were incorporated into an organic polymer monolith containing 3‐acrylamidophenylboronic acid (AAPBA) and pentaerythritol triacrylate (PETA) to form a novel monolithic stationary phase for CEC. The effects of the mass ratio of AAPBA/PETA, the amount of GO, and the volume of porogen on the morphology, permeability and pore properties of the prepared poly(AAPBA‐GO‐PETA) monoliths were investigated. A series of test compounds including amides, alkylbenzenes, polycyclic aromatics, phenols, and anilines were used to evaluate and compare the separation performances of the poly(AAPBA‐GO‐PETA) and the parent poly(AAPBA‐co‐PETA) monoliths. The results indicated that incorporation of GO into monolithic column exhibited much higher resolutions (>1.5) and column efficiency (62 000 ～ 110 000 plates/m for toluene, DMF, formamide, and thiourea) than the poly(AAPBA‐co‐PETA). The successful application in isocratic separation of peptides suggests the potential of the GO incorporated monolithic column in complex sample analysis. In addition, the reproducibility and stability of the prepared poly(AAPBA‐GO‐PETA) monolith was assessed. The run‐to‐run, column‐to‐column and batch‐to‐batch reproducibilities of this monolith for alkylbenzenes’ retention were satisfactory with the RSDs less than 1.8% (n = 5), 3.7% and 5.6% (n = 3), respectively, indicating the effectiveness and practicability of the proposed method.     

Single nucleotide polymorphisms of mitochondrial DNA HVS‐I and HVS‐II in Chinese Bai ethnic group

For forensic and population genetic purposes, a total of 125 unrelated volunteers’ blood samples were collected from Chinese Bai ethnic minority group to analyze sequence variation of two hypervariable segments (HVS‐I and HVS‐II) in the mitochondrial DNA control region. Comparing the HVS‐I and HVS‐II sequences of the 125 Chinese Bais to the Anderson reference sequence, we found 86 polymorphic loci in HVS‐I and 40 in HVS‐II in mitochondrial DNA sequences of the Chinese Bai ethnic minority group, which defined 93 and 53 different haplotypes, respectively. Haplotype diversity and the mean pairwise differences were 0.992 ± 0.003 and 6.553 in HVS‐I, and 0.877 ± 0.027 and 2.407 in HVS‐II, respectively. We defined four macrohaplogroups R, M, N and D with the proportions ranging from 9.6% to 40.0%. With the analysis of the hypervariable domain from nucleotide 16 180–16 193 in HVS‐I, our study revealed new haplotypes of sequence variations. In addition, the Fst metric, phylogenetic tree, and principal component analysis demonstrated a close genetic relationship between the Bai group and Chinese Han populations from South China, Changsha, and Guangdong. The results support that the Bai group is a multiorigin ethnic minority that has merged with the Chinese Han population.     

Sensitive colorimetric assays for α-glucosidase activity and inhibitor screening based on unmodified gold nanoparticles

A colorimetric sensor has been developed in this work to sensitively detect α-glucosidase activity and screen α-glucosidase inhibitors (AGIs) utilizing unmodified gold nanoparticles (AuNPs). The sensing strategy is based on triple-catalytic reaction triggered by α-glucosidase. In the presence of α-glucosidase, aggregation of AuNPs is prohibited due to the oxidation of cysteine to cystine in the system. However, with addition of AGIs, cysteine induced aggregation of AuNPs occurs. Thus, a new method for α-glucosidase activity detection and AGIs screening is developed by measuring the UV–vis absorption or visually distinguishing. A well linear relation is presented in a range of 0.0025–0.05 U mL⁻¹. The detection limit is found to be 0.001 U mL⁻¹ for α-glucosidase assay, which is one order of magnitude lower than other reports. The IC₅₀ values of four kinds of inhibitors observed with this method are in accordance with other reports. The using of unmodified AuNPs in this work avoids the complicated and time-consuming modification procedure. This simple and efficient colorimetric method can also be extended to other enzymes assays.     

Antioxidative Cassane Diterpenoids from the Seeds of Caesalpinia minax

Five new cassane diterpenoids, caesalmins I–M ( 1 – 5 ), and 23 known analogs were isolated from the seeds of Caesalpinia minax. Their structures were elucidated by spectroscopic methods and comparison with reported data. The antioxidant properties of 1 – 28 were determined by the method of oxygen radical absorbance capacity of fluorescein (ORAC‐FL), and 14 compounds exhibited good antioxidant activities with ORAC‐FL values of 2.24–4.89 Trolox equivalents. The structure? activity relationship of the active compounds was also discussed.     

Humic acids as both matrix for matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization time-of-flight mass spectrometry and adsorbent for magnetic solid phase extraction

In the present study, humic acids (HAs) were applied as both a matrix for matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization time-of-flight mass spectrometry (MALDI-TOF-MS) and an adsorbent of magnetic solid phase extraction (MSPE) for the first time. As natural macromolecule compounds, HAs are inherently highly functionalized and contain laser energy absorbing–transferring aromatic structures. This special molecular structure made HAs a good candidate for use as a MALDI matrix in small molecule analysis. At the same time, due to its good adsorption ability, HAs was prepared as MSPE adsorbent via a simple co-mixing method, in which the commercially available HAs were directly mixed with Fe₃O₄ magnetic nanoparticles (MNPs) in a mortar and grinded evenly and completely. In this process, MNPs were physically wrapped and adhered to tiny HAs leading to the formation of magnetic HAs (MHAs). To verify the bi-function of the MHAs, Rhodamine B (RdB) was chosen as model compound. Our results show that the combination of MHAs-based MSPE and MALDI-TOF-MS can provide a rapid and sensitive method for the determination of RdB in chili oil. The whole analytical procedure could be completed within 30 min for simultaneous determination of more than 20 samples, and the limit of quantitation for RdB was found to be 0.02 μg/g. The recoveries in chili oil were in the range 73.8–81.5% with the RSDs less than 21.3% (intraday) and 20.3% (interday). The proposed strategy has potential applications for high-throughput analysis of small molecules in complex samples.     

Copper(I)-1,1,1-tris(diphenylphosphinomethyl)ethane complexes with different coordination modes tuned by auxiliary ligands and their spectroscopic properties

Three mono-, bi- and tetranuclear copper(I) complexes, [Cu(phen)(triphos-O)]BF₄ (1) (phen = 1,10-phenanthroline, triphos = 1,1,1-tris(diphenylphosphinomethyl)ethane), [Cu₂(bipy)(triphos)₂](BF₄)₂ (2) (bipy = 4,4′-bipyridine), and [Cu₄(MeOC^N^N)₄(triphos)₂(bipy)](BF₄)₄ (3) (MeOC^N^N = 6-(4-methoxyphenyl)-2,2′-bipyridine), have been synthesized and characterized by NMR spectroscopy, electrospray ionization, and matrix-assisted laser desorption ionization time-of-flight mass spectrometries, elemental analysis, and X-ray crystal analysis. The crystal structure investigation revealed the copper ions of the complexes have pseudo-tetrahedral coordination geometry. The electronic absorption spectra of 1, 2, and 3 contain low-energy bands at 350–500 and 400–650 nm, which are assigned to d(Cu) → π*(phen or bipy) and a mixture of d(Cu) → π*(MeOC^N^N) and d(Cu) → π*(bipy) transitions, respectively. Complex 2 displays a strong, long-lived solid-state emission with a maximum at 555 nm and lifetime of 13.6 μs at room temperature. Photoinduced electron-transfer properties of 2 and 3 involving nanosecond time-resolved absorption spectroscopy and electron spin resonance techniques were studied.     

多金核二氧化铈空心球用于硝基苯酚催化加氢

催化剂的微观结构在催化还原反应、有机物氧化反应及有机物转化反应中起着关键作用。本文利用无模板方法合成了多金核中空二氧化铈微球催化剂。将制备好的二氧化铈中空微球浸渍到一定浓度的氯金酸溶液中,然后多次洗涤除去表面吸附的氯金酸离子,最后通过硼氢化钠还原制成中空氧化铈微球包覆的多金核的核壳结构催化剂。将该核壳结构材料用于硝基苯酚加氢反应与金纳米粒子及氧化铈微球相比,多金核中空二氧化铈核壳结构表现出优越的活性和稳定性。通过这种浸渍洗涤再还原的简单方法合成的多金核二氧化铈催化剂有望应用于生物医药和能源环境等领域。     

Biodegradable microspheres with poly(<Emphasis Type="Italic">N</Emphasis>-isopropylacrylamide) Enriched surface: Thermo-responsibility,biodegradation and drug release

Microspheres with thermo-responsible surface were fabricated by PCL-b-PEO-b-PNIPAM triblock copolymers. Thermo-responsible morphological changes of PCL-b-PEO-b-PNIPAM microspheres immersed in aqueous solution at temperatures above the LCST (e.g. 37 °C) were observed from porous surface structure to compact surface layer. Enzymatic degradation and in vitro drug release results showed that the thermo-responsible surface layer greatly influenced the degradation of microspheres as well as the drug release behavior from microspheres. With the copolymerization of PNIPAM block into PCL-b-PEO copolymers, the drug release could be well regulated by changing temperatures and microspheres composition, which revealed the great potentials of microspheres with thermo-responsible surface for controlled drug release.     

Topological Effect on the Structure of Self‐Assembled Aggregates from Amphiphilic Macromolecules in Solution

The self‐assembled morphologies of cyclic amphiphiles, which are composed of a long hydrophobic block and a short hydrophilic block, in selective solutions are studied by using a simulated annealing method. The morphological dependence of the aggregates on solvent quality is investigated. The topology effects are studied by comparing results from linear counterparts of the amphiphiles. It is observed that, in addition to spherical micelles, cylindrical micelles, disklike micelles, vesicles, and large compound micelles, muticompartment vesicles with several fluidic cores can be formed by the cyclic systems. The morphologies are regulated by the interaction parameter ε_AS between the hydrophobic block and solvents. Furthermore, it is revealed that the differences of characteristics of the self‐assembled aggregates originate from the difference in architectural constraint. The wide region of forming multicompartment vesicles suggests that cyclic amphiphilic macromolecules could be a suitable candidate for applications to deliver multiple functional components by compartmentalizing different components in different confined space of vesicles.