Novel axially chiral bis-arylthiourea-based organocatalysts for asymmetric Friedel-Crafts type reactions

It has been shown that catalytic amounts (10-20 mol %) of novel axially chiral bis-arylthioureas promote the asymmetric organocatalytic Friedel-Crafts type addition of indole and N-methylindole to nitroolefins. The optimum catalyst is capable of promoting the reaction between challenging substrates such as N-methylindole and nitroolefins bearing aliphatic β-substituents with enantioselectivity unprecedented for an organocatalytic system.     

Solubility and preferential solvation of indomethacin in 1,4-dioxane + water solvent mixtures

The solubilities of indomethacin (IMC) in 1,4-dioxane + water cosolvent mixtures were determined at several temperatures, 293.15–313.15 K. The thermodynamic functions: Gibbs energy, enthalpy, and entropy of solution and of mixing were obtained from these data by using the van’t Hoff and Gibbs equations. The solubility was maximal in 0.95 mass fraction of 1,4-dioxane and very low in pure water at all the temperatures. A non-linear plot of ΔH_soln ° vs. ΔG_soln ° with negative slope from pure water up to 0.60 mass fraction of 1,4-dioxane and positive beyond this up to 0.95 mass fraction of 1,4-dioxane was obtained. Accordingly, the driving mechanism for IMC solubility in water-rich mixtures is the entropy, probably due to water-structure loss around the drug non-polar moieties by 1,4-dioxane, whereas, above 0.60 mass fraction of 1,4-dioxane the driving mechanism is the enthalpy, probably due to IMC solvation increase by the co-solvent molecules. The preferential solvation of IMC by the components of the solvent was estimated by means of the quasi-lattice quasi-chemical method, whereas the inverse Kirkwood-Buff integral method could not be applied because of divergence of the integrals in intermediate compositions.     

Pure optical dephasing dynamics in semiconducting single-walled carbon nanotubes

We report a detailed study of ultrafast exciton dephasing processes in semiconducting single-walled carbon nanotubes employing a sample highly enriched in a single tube species, the (6,5) tube. Systematic measurements of femtosecond pump-probe, two-pulse photon echo, and three-pulse photon echo peak shift over a broad range of excitation intensities and lattice temperature (from 4.4 to 292 K) enable us to quantify the timescales of pure optical dephasing (T(2)(*)), along with exciton-exciton and exciton-phonon scattering, environmental effects as well as spectral diffusion. While the exciton dephasing time (T(2)) increases from 205 fs at room temperature to 320 fs at 70 K, we found that further decrease of the lattice temperature leads to a shortening of the T(2) times. This complex temperature dependence was found to arise from an enhanced relaxation of exciton population at lattice temperatures below 80 K. By quantitatively accounting the contribution from the population relaxation, the corresponding pure optical dephasing times increase monotonically from 225 fs at room temperature to 508 fs at 4.4 K. We further found that below 180 K, the pure dephasing rate (1/T(2)(*)) scales linearly with temperature with a slope of 6.7 ± 0.6 μeV/K, which suggests dephasing arising from one-phonon scattering (i.e., acoustic phonons). In view of the large dynamic disorder of the surrounding environment, the origin of the long room temperature pure dephasing time is proposed to result from reduced strength of exciton-phonon coupling by motional narrowing over nuclear fluctuations. This consideration further suggests the occurrence of remarkable initial exciton delocalization and makes nanotubes ideal to study many-body effects in spatially confined systems.     

Coaxial metal and magnetic alloy nanotubes in polycarbonate templates by electroless deposition

We present a novel technique for the preparation of coaxial metal and magnetic alloy nanotubes, which is demonstrated for the coaxial nanotubes of Ni/Co and Ni/CoNiFe alloys deposited in activated polycarbonate templates using electroless plating. For each metal or alloy the tube wall thickness was controlled to be less than 100 nm. The process involved two consecutive deposition steps from hypophosphite and/or borane reducing agent based electroless plating solutions. We further characterise the magnetic properties of the ternary magnetic alloy films and coaxial nanotubes. The coaxial tubes show homogenous wall thickness and composition, which is delineated from the magnetic measurements.     

Direct measurement ofk o for monitor neutron activation analysis

This paper introduces the thermal column or the cold neutron guide beam of the 20 MW NBSR at the National Institute of Standards and Technology as a directk _o measurement facility. Measurement ofk _o at this facility not only produces accurate values, but avoids the additional correction factors needed in other measurement methods. Thek _o of Sb, Ag and Cr with respect to Sc as monitor have been measured and their values are comparable to values based on tabulated nuclear constants and to those measured by other researchers.     

Preferential Solvation of Ketoprofen in Some Co-solvent Binary Mixtures

The preferential solvation parameters of ketoprofen (KTP) in ethanol (EtOH) + water and propylene glycol (PG) + water binary solvent mixtures were obtained from their thermodynamic properties by means of the inverse Kirkwood–Buff integrals (IKBI) and quasi-lattice quasi-chemical methods. According to the IKBI method, it is found that KTP is very sensitive to specific solvation effects, so the preferential solvation parameter by co-solvents, δx _1,3, is negative in the water-rich mixtures of both binary systems but positive in the other compositions at temperatures of 293.15, 303.15 and 313.15 K. From this it can be assumed that, in water-rich mixtures, hydrophobic hydration around the aromatic rings and the methyl group, present in the drug, plays a relevant role in the solvation. The bigger amount of drug solvation by the co-solvent in mixtures of similar solvent proportions and in co-solvent-rich mixtures could be due mainly to polarity effects. Moreover, in these mixtures the solute will be acting as a Lewis acid with the co-solvent molecules, because they are more basic than water.     

Alkenes from terminal epoxides using lithium 2,2,6,6-tetramethylpiperidide and organolithiums or grignard reagents

E-Alkenes (including arylated alkenes, dienes, and allylsilanes) are efficiently prepared by alpha-deprotonation of terminal epoxides using lithium 2,2,6,6-tetramethylpiperidide, followed by in situ trapping with organolithiums or Grignard reagents.     

Determination of the effective charge on muonium during its reaction in aqueous solution

The rate of reaction of muonium atoms with solutes of either charge is unaffected by the addition of a high concentration of an inert salt, therefore the effective charge on the muonium at the point of reaction is essentially zero.     

Cellulose crystallites

This article discusses advances in understanding the structural and physicochemical characteristics of suspensions of cellulose crystallites prepared by acid hydrolysis of natural cellulose fibres. Consideration of recent developments in visualization of crystallite ultrastructure may provide clues to suspension behavior. In addition, novel applications in a diverse range of fields are presented, from iridescent pigments to biomolecular NMR studies.