Templateless room-temperature assembly of nanowire networks from nanoparticles

We demonstrate a new, room-temperature approach to assemble two-dimensional and three-dimensional networks of gold nanowires by agitating nanoparticles in a toluene-aqueous mixture, without the use of templates. The nanowires have a uniform diameter of about 5 nm and consist of coalesced face-centered cubic nanocrystals. Toluene molecules passivate the gold surfaces during nanoparticle coalescence, rendering the nanowires hydrophobic and enabling their transfer into the toluene layer. Such templateless low-temperature assembly of mesostructures from nanoscale building blocks open up new possibilities for creating porous self-supporting nanocatalysts, nanowires for device interconnection, and low-density high-strength nanofillers for composites.     

Improved synthesis of proline-derived Ni(II) complexes of glycine: versatile chiral equivalents of nucleophilic glycine for general asymmetric synthesis of alpha-amino acids

A synthetically practical and operationally convenient method for preparing (S)-2-[N-(N'-benzylprolyl)amino]benzophenone (BPBP) and hitherto unknown (S)-2-[N-(N'-benzylprolyl)amino]-4-methylbenzophenone (4-Me-BPBP), (S)-2-[N-(N'-benzylprolyl)amino]-5-nitrobenzophenone (5-NO(2)-BPBP), and their corresponding Ni(II) complexes with glycine [GlyNi(II)BPBP], a widely used chiral equivalent of nucleophilic glycine, and new analogues [GlyNi(II)-4-Me-BPBP] and [GlyNi(II)-5- NO(2)-BPBP] is described. The key step of the method is the synthetically efficient amid bond formation between the corresponding o-aminobenzophenones, featuring significant steric shielding and low nucleophilicity of the amino functionality as well as sterically constrained (S)-N-benzylproline (BP).     

Topological analysis of the charge density response of a Ni4 cluster to a probe H2 molecule

Local density self-consistent field (SCF) discrete variationalX calculations are performed on a Ni₄ tetrahedron interacting with a probe H₂ molecule in special geometries. Optimized basis functions generated from the spherically averaged SCF potential are used. Topological charge-density analyses and binding energy calculations are used to study a portion of the energy surface for the approach of the H₂ molecule toward the Ni₄ tetrahedron. The effect of the H₂ molecule on Ni-Ni, Ni-H bonds and changes in the H-H covalent bond are investigated with the help of the field and various data at its critical points. The qualitative relationship between these data and the calculated binding energies is exploited.     

Self-consistent calculation of electron density and muon hyperfine field in transition metals and their compounds

The use of finite cluster models to represent the electronic structure of solids in the framework of self-consistent local density theory is reviewed. The embedding problem is discussed, and practical variational approaches to treating crystalline potentials and wavefunction boundary conditions are presented. Hyperfine fields at ⁺ sites in Fe, Ni, and Co are found to result from a delicate balance between negative contributions of deep-lying (bound, paired) states and positive contributions due to polarization of band levels near the Fermi energy. The nature of muon screening, and the potential for ⁺ in Cu and Al are briefly considered. Finally, we explore the likely binding sites and bonding mechanisms for ⁺ in the defect compound VO _x .