Improved STR typing of telogen hair root and hair shaft DNA

Today the STR typing of telogen hair and hair shafts is regarded as a challenge. The small DNA quantity in the hair is highly degraded. Another problem are PCR inhibitors in the hair. In particular hair pigments, the melanins, are known to inhibit PCR. Hairs are exposed to sunlight and partly to chemical oxidation processes, which make them even more difficult to analyze. To increase the chances of a correct typing of hair, the small amount of DNA must be successfully isolated and the inhibitors have to be removed or neutralized. Furthermore, miniSTR typing improves the analysis of stains with degraded DNA like it is the case with hair. We introduce a nonorganic extraction method and in addition a miniSTR concept which is promising in typing stains with little and degraded DNA, especially hairs. The miniSTR concept including five database STRs (SE33, VWA, TH01, FGA, D3S1358) and the gender typing system Amelogenin was optimized for the amplification of hair DNA. Compared to commercial STR kits, this approach resulted in considerably higher success rates.     

Synthesis of PbTiO3 ceramics using mechanical alloying and solid state sintering

The pressure-less sintering behavior of PbTiO₃ powders synthesized by mechanical alloying TiO₂ and PbO was investigated using dilatometry and Rietveld refinements of X-ray diffraction patterns. As-synthesized, the powders are nanocrystalline with a mean particle size of 20 nm. Pressure-less sintering in the range 500-1050°C gives single phase ceramics with densities of 85-90% and crystallite sizes in the range 80-400 nm. Cracking due to the paraelectric-ferroelectric phase transition was not observed in samples sintered below 700°C due to the small crystallite size whereas macroscopic cracks formed in samples sintered above 700°C. Rietveld analysis indicates the formation of Pb vacancies in samples sintered and held for 24 h at intermediate temperatures (600-1000°C) which gives some insight into the mechanism of Pb loss and second phase formation in this system.     

Tautomerism,regioisomerism, and cyclization reactions of acridinyl thiosemicarbazides

The regioselectivities of methyl‐ and phenylhydrazine with acridin‐9‐yl isothiocyanate (thus yielding thiosemicarbazides with acridine substituted on the urea‐type side) were examined. Methylhydrazine regioselectivity was high with the α‐nitrogen atom overwhelmingly more nucleophilic than the β‐nitrogen atom; phenylhydrazine regioselectivity was poor but varied with the solvent and only in the case of ethanol was nucleophilic predominance of the α‐nitrogen atom pronounced. Of note, whilst both phenyl thiosemicarbazides were present in solution only as spiro forms, the methyl product was present as an equilibrium mixture of open‐chain and spiro thiosemicarbazides. Reactions on the NH₂ blocked analogue of methyl acridin‐9‐ylthiosemicarbazide (1‐isopropylidene‐2‐methylthiosemicarbazide) were also examined. Interestingly, present in the starting material itself was a structural motif of novelty wherein a triazolethione represented the major species of an equilibrium between cyclic and open‐chain forms.     

The four-electron diamagnetic ring current of porphycene

Porphycene, an isomer that can replace porphin in chemical and biochemical contexts, is predicted by ab initio calculation to exhibit a global diatropic pi ring current with bifurcation across the four pyrrole units of the macrocycle. Analysis of the orbital contributions to the current density in porphycene reveals that the global current, with its bifurcation feature, is attributable to the four electrons of the near-degenerate HOMO levels, the same set of active electrons that feature in the well-known four-orbital model of the electronic spectra of porphyrins. Integration of the current density gives 1H, 13C and 15N NMR shieldings that are compatible with the observed low-field shifts of peripheral and bridge protons and high-field shift of the internal NH protons, assignment of the 13C NMR spectrum and the single average 15N chemical shift resulting from rapid NH tautomerism. Geometries were calculated with the DFT B3LYP functional, the current density maps were calculated with the ipsocentric coupled-Hartree-Fock CTOCD-DZ method, and the shieldings with the CTOCD-PZ2 variant, all in the same 6-31G** basis.     

Solution- and bound-state conformational study of N,N',N"-triacetyl chitotriose and other analogous potential inhibitors of hevamine: application of trNOESY and STD NMR spectroscopy

The solution-state conformations of N,N',N"-triacetyl chitotriose (1) and other potential chitinase inhibitors 2-4 were studied using a combination of NMR spectroscopy (NOESY) and molecular mechanics calculations. Determination solely of the global energy minimum conformation was found to be insufficient for an agreement with the NMR results. An appropriate consistency between the NMR experimental data and theoretical calculations was only reached by assessing the structures as population-weighted average conformers based on Boltzmann distributions derived from the calculated relative energies. Analogies, but also particular differences, between the synthetic compounds 2-4 and the naturally-occurring N,N',N"-triacetyl chitotriose were found. Furthermore, the conformation of compounds 1 and 2 when bound to hevamine was also studied using transferred NOESY experiments and the binding process was found to impart a level of conformational restriction on the ligands. The preferred conformation as determined for 1 in the bound state to hevamine belonged to one of the conformational families found for the compound when free in solution, although full characterisation of the bound-state conformations was impeded due to severe signal overlap. Saturation transfer difference NMR experiments were also employed to analyse the binding epitopes of the bound compounds. We thus determined that it is mainly the acetyl amido groups of the trisaccharide and the heterocyclic moiety which are in close contact with hevamine.     

Synthesis and stereochemical studies of 1- and 2-phenyl-substituted 1,3-oxazino[4,3-a]isoquinoline derivatives

Starting from the 1′- or 2′-phenyl-substituted 1-(2′-hydroxyethyl)-6,7-dimethoxy-1,2,3,4-tetrahydroisoquinoline diastereomers 3 and 6, 4-unsubstituted and 4-(p-nitrophenyl)- and 4-oxo-substituted 1-phenyl- and 2-phenyl-9,10-dimethoxy-2H,4H-1,6,7,11b-tetrahydro-1,3-oxazino[4,3-a]isoquinolines (7-12) were prepared. The relative configurations and the predominant conformations of the products were determined by NMR spectroscopy, by quantum chemical calculations and, for (2R^∗,4S^∗,11bR^∗)-9,10-dimethoxy-4-(p-nitrophenyl)-2-phenyl-2H,4H-1,6,7,11b-tetrahydro-1,3-oxazino[4,3-a]isoquinoline (11), by X-ray diffraction.     

SynCar: an approach to automated synthesis

The automation of all aspects of manual solution-phase synthesis into one integrated, efficient, and reliable system could be regarded as something of an unmet challenge in organic chemistry. The requirements for modern solution-phase libraries in mainstream drug discovery is typically 50-250 high-purity compounds on a 10-100-mg scale, whether for target class libraries or lead optimization, and short cycle time in combination with high capacity is critical. To achieve these goals, in a codevelopment between Aventis and Accelab GmbH, Kusterdingen, Germany, we designed a completely novel system of independent workstations connected by a shuttle transfer system produced by Montech, Derendingen, Switzerland. Seven modular workstations process four reactions on each shuttle in parallel, with the ability to perform synthesis (temperature control and liquid reagent handling), filtration, liquid-liquid extraction, evaporation, weighing, solid-phase extraction, and HPLC/MS analysis. The modular design enables the continuous loading of shuttles at any time, and each shuttle can have its own workflow. The design also allows easy expansion for future needs. The result is a combination of high flexibility and high throughput.     

Ab initio study of the substituent effects on the relative stability of the E and Z conformers of phenyl esters. Stereoelectronic effects on the reactivity of the carbonyl group

Equilibria between the Z (tau1= 0 degrees) and E (tau1= 180 degrees) conformers of p-substituted phenyl acetates 4 and trifluoroacetates 5 (X = OMe, Me, H, Cl, CN, NO2) were studied by ab initio calculations at the HF/6-31G* and MP2/6-31G* levels of theory. The preference for the Z conformer, DeltaE(HF), was calculated to be 5.36 kcal mol(-1) and 7.50 kcal mol(-1) for phenyl acetate and phenyl trifluoroacetate (i.e., with X = H), respectively. The increasing electron-withdrawing ability of the phenyl substituent X increases the preference of the Z conformer. An excellent correlation with a negative slope was observed for both series between DeltaE of the E-Z equilibrium and the Hammett sigma constant. By using an appropriate isodesmic reaction, it was shown that electron-withdrawing substituents decrease the stability of both conformers, but the effect is higher with the E conformer. Electron-withdrawing phenyl substituents decrease the delocalization of the lone pair of the ether oxygen to the C=O antibonding orbital (nO--> pi*C=O) in both the E and Z forms and in both series studied; this effect is higher in the E conformer than in the Z conformer. The nO --> pi*C=O electron donation has a minimum value with tau1= 90 degrees and a maximum value with tau1= 0 degrees (the Z conformer), the value with tau1= 180 degrees (the E conformer) being between these two values, obviously due to steric hindrance. The effects of the phenyl substituents on the reactivity of the esters studied are discussed in terms of molecular orbital interactions. ED/EW substituents adjust the availability of the pi*C=O antibonding orbital to interact with the lone pair orbital of the attacking nucleophile and therefore affect the reactivity: EW substituents increase and ED substituents decrease it. Excellent correlations were observed between the rate coefficients of nucleophilic acyl substitutions and pi*C=O occupancies of the ester series 4 and 5.     

Combined use of small-angle neutron scattering and atom probe tomography for the analysis of precipitates in a Fe-15 m% Co-25 m% Mo alloy

Atom probe tomography (APT) measurements were conducted to analyze nm-sized precipitates in a Fe-25 m% Co-15 m% Mo model alloy. Calculation of isoconcentration surfaces and application of cluster-search algorithms yielded the chemical compositions of matrix and precipitates. Small-angle neutron scattering (SANS) was performed in order to calculate the ratio of magnetic to nuclear scattering. This so-called A-ratio was compared with values calculated from the chemical information derived from the atom probe data. For this, the magnetism of the precipitates has to be taken into account. Ab-initio studies have been carried out to determine the magnetic moment of the precipitate phase. The results show that the extremely fine precipitates are ferromagnetic and exhibit near-equilibrium composition. In the very early stage of decomposition, however, the composition is different from near-equilibrium. The influences of the magnetism of the precipitates as well as of artifacts from atom probe measurements on the obtained results are discussed.