Simultaneous quantification of five major constituents in stems of Dracaena plants and related medicinal preparations from China and Vietnam by HPLC–DAD

A high‐performance liquid chromatographic (HPLC) method was developed for the simultaneous quantification of five major bioactive constituents in the stems of resiniferous Dracaena plants from China and Vietnam, as well as those in the related traditional Chinese medicinal preparations. A diode array detector with the wavelength of 330 nm was used to monitor resveratrol, 7,4′‐dihydroxyflavone and pterostilbene, while loureirin A and loureirin B were monitored at 280 nm. The five constituents were separated on an Agela SB C₁₈ column by gradient elution using 0.008% (v/v) formic acid solution (A) and acetonitrile (B) as the mobile phase. The validation of the method included recovery, linearity, accuracy and precision (intra‐ and inter‐day variation). The range of recoveries of this method was 98.1–104.9%, with all the constituents showing good linearity (r² > 0.9999). The accuracy and precision were satisfactory, with the overall intra‐ and inter‐day variation being less than 4%. The present method has been successfully applied for the determination of all five constituents in 21 related herbal samples including 10 D. cochinchinensis stem samples, seven D. cambodiana stem samples and four purchased medicinal preparations. The contents of these constituents were analyzed using principal component analysis, which can efficiently identify raw herb of Dracaena from different sources. The study may be considered helpful to the quality control of Dracena plants and its medicinal preparations. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

MgO缺陷和不规则表面吸附Cl2的电子结构研究

采用从头算程序对MgO表面 3种不同配位位置吸附Cl2 的构型进行优化 ,并用扩展休克尔紧束缚 (EHT)晶体轨道方法对MgO的缺陷和不规则表面吸附Cl2的可能构型进行能带计算 ,讨论了吸附前后能带组成和成键性质的变化。研究表明 :MgO表面吸附Cl2 将更趋向于吸附在O原子上而非Mg原子上 ,而且在 3种配位中MgO表面三配位氧最有利于吸附Cl2 ;吸附时 ,电子从O原子转移到Cl2 分子的反键轨道 ,但是各种吸附构型的MgO表面对Cl2 的吸附作用均比较微弱 ,是典型的物理吸附。     

Application of terahertz spectroscopy and molecular modeling in isomers investigation: Glucose and fructose

Terahertz spectra of glucose and fructose have been measured by terahertz time-domain spectroscopy (THz-TDS) at room temperature. Because they have the same molecular formula, the differences of the THz spectra can be attributed to their molecular structures and the arrangement of molecules in unit cell. In this paper, gaseous-state theory has been employed to simulate the isolated molecule of these two isomers. The results indicate that experimental THz spectral features (0.5 – 4.0 THz) of glucose and fructose arise from the mixture of intramolecular and intermolecular modes, involving hydrogen bonds and covalent bonds, and with the intermolecular modes dominating.     

A Silicon Nanowire‐Based Electrochemical Sensor with High Sensitivity and Electrocatalytic Activity

A new kind of silicon nanowire (SiNWs)‐based nanoelectrode assembly, a gold‐nanoparticle‐decorated silicon nanowire array (AuNPs@SiNWsAr), is employed for the construction of high‐performance electrochemical sensors. Significantly, the electrochemical nanosensors are capable of sensitive detection of various electroactive molecules (e.g., dopamine (DA), ascorbic acid (AA), hydrogen peroxide (H₂O₂), and glucose). Further, DA molecules loaded on the surface of AuNPs@SiNWsAr preserve stable high electroactivity overnight without special protection, while free DA molecules may lose their biological activity due to severe oxidization in ambient environment. These findings may offer new opportunities for the design of high‐performance electrochemical nanosensors with high sensitivity and robust stability.     

The Generalized Thermo Jaynes–Cummings Model and?Its Energy Spectrum

By analyzing the characteristics of thermo field dynamics, we present a new generalized thermo Jaynes-Cummings (TJC) model at finite temperature including the thermal effects and expatiate on its physical explanation. By virtue of Lewis-Riesenfeld invariant method, we obtain its exact eigenenergy spectrum and the explicit expressions for the evolution operator of the wavefunctions. In addition, we evaluate various expectation values of physical quantities and find the pseudo-invariant eigen-operator for the generalized TJC Hamiltonian.     

Surface modification of zinc oxide nanorods for potential applications in organic materials

A facile and simple modification method towards changing surface property of ZnO nanorods from a hydrophilic one to a hydrophobic one have been developed by refluxing precursor in three-necked flask. Comparing with the other modifiers discussed in the paper, NDZ-311w titanate coupling agent was selected as the best one not only because of the good lipophilic modification effect, but also for its multifunctional groups could play a crucial part in further composite with organic materials. Moreover, transmission electron microscopy (TEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD) and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), respectively, were used to evaluate the morphology, structure and combinative way before and after surface modification. The TEM result showed, after modifying process, there was a thin layer capping on the surface of ZnO nanorods which could be considered as NDZ-311w titanate coupling agent. Through the structure analysis by XRD, it was found that the surface modification had not substantially altered crystalline structure. Besides, the FT-IR test proved that NDZ-311w titanate coupling agent was rather covalently bonded to the surface of ZnO nanorods than physically capping. More practically speaking, the NDZ-311w titanate coupling agent modified ZnO nanorods have much more potential applications in organic materials than unmodified ones.     

Bipolar copolymers comprised mesogen‐jacketed polymer containing oxadiazole units and PVK as host materials for electroluminescent devices

Nonconjugated bipolar transport polymers have been developed as host materials for electroluminescent devices by incorporating both electron‐transporting and hole‐transporting functionalities into copolymers. The random copolymer PCt‐nvk3‐7 containing mesogen‐jacketed segment of P‐Ct have been synthesized and characterized. The effect of mesogen‐jacketed segment content of these bipolar copolymers on device performance has been investigated. The results of polymer light‐emitting diodes (PLEDs) show that the jacketed content of copolymers has a significant effect on device performance: lowering charge transport and facilitating the hole‐electron recombination leads to much higher current efficiency. Applying these high triplet random copolymers as host, the maximum current efficiency of 0.70 cd/A and the maximum brightness of 1872.8 cd/m² was achieved for PCt‐nvk3‐7 with an orange‐emitting complex dopant. The results suggest that the bipolar copolymers PCt‐nvks can be good host polymers for electrophosphorescent devices. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Polym Sci Part A: Polym Chem 46: 7861–7867, 2008     

Detection of deletion mutations in DNA using water-soluble cationic fluorescent thiophene copolymer

In this contribution, we designed a fluorescent thiophene copolymer to detect insertion/deletion mutation in DNA by doping aldehyde group in the main chain. The fluorescence of the copolymer could be dramatically quenched on the addition of single-stranded DNA (ssDNA) via strong electrostatic interactions and electronic/energy transfer. Although the complementary ssDNA made the fluorescence recover, the hydrogen bonds and chemical coupling also played a significant role between the unpaired bases and aldehyde group, which could differentiate the subtle differences in such mutant DNA. The influence of buffer pH, concentration of NaCl, heating time and the temperature was systemically investigated and the proposed method was then successfully applied to detect real sample. With the respect to the linearity, limit of detection precision, specificity, this procedure could provide sensitive methodologies for the rapid detection and identification of nucleic acids.