A nafion/crown ether film electrode and its application in the anodic stripping voltammetric determination of traces of silver

Glassy carbon electrodes are modified by coating with dicyclohexyl-18-crown-6 in Nafion-117. The electrode is used for a very sensitive anodic stripping voltammetric determination of silver. High sensitivity is obtained owing to the release of crown molecules from the silver-crown complex during the deposition. The detection limit is 2×10^?12 M after electrodeposition for 30 min. The recommended supporting electrolyte is 4×10^?3–7×10^?3 M potassium chloride in 0.01 M nitric acid with a deposition potential of ?0.30 V vs. SCE and a linear potential scan. Three typical calibration graphs were linear over the range 2×10^?11–1×10^?8 M for deposition times of 30, 20 and 8 min, respectively. The silver content of reagent-grade ammonium nitrate was found to be 0.48×10^?4% with a relative standard deviation of 3.7% (n=7) for parallel determinations.     

Direct STM investigation of cinchona alkaloid adsorption on Cu(III)

Scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) combined with cyclic voltammetry has been employed to investigate the adsorption of cinchonine on Cu(111). Similar to cinchonidine, cinchonine forms a long-range ordered adlayer with (4 x 4) symmetry on the substrate. The structural details on molecular adsorption were obtained by high-resolution STM images. On the basis of the previous results and obtained STM images, the quinoline ring is proposed to lie parallel to Cu(111) and serve as an anchoring group. The chiral quinuclidine moiety extends out of the surface to facilitate the interaction with the prochiral reactants.     

Quantum Information Entropies on Hyperbolic Single Potential Wells

In this work, we study the quantum information entropies for two different types of hyperbolic single potential wells. We first study the behaviors of the moving particle subject to two different hyperbolic potential wells through focusing on their wave functions. The shapes of these hyperbolic potentials are similar, but we notice that their momentum entropy densities change along with the width of each potential and the magnitude of position entropy density decreases when the momentum entropy magnitude increases. On the other hand, we illustrate the behaviors of their position and momentum entropy densities. Finally, we show the variation of position and momentum entropies Sx and Sp with the change of the potential well depth u and verify that their sum still satisfies the BBM inequality relation.     

KEADA: Identifying Key Classes in Software Systems Using Dynamic Analysis and Entropy-Based Metrics

Software maintenance is indispensable in the software development process. Developers need to spend a lot of time and energy to understand the software when maintaining the software, which increases the difficulty of software maintenance. It is a feasible method to understand the software through the key classes of the software. Identifying the key classes of the software can help developers understand the software more quickly. Existing techniques on key class identification mainly use static analysis techniques to extract software structure information. Such structure information may contain redundant relationships that may not exist when the software runs and ignores the actual interaction times between classes. In this paper, we propose an approach based on dynamic analysis and entropy-based metrics to identify key classes in the Java GUI software system, called KEADA (identifying KEy clAsses based on Dynamic Analysis and entropy-based metrics). First, KEADA extracts software structure information by recording the calling relationship between classes during the software running process; such structure information takes into account the actual interaction of classes. Second, KEADA represents the structure information as a weighted directed network and further calculates the importance of each node using an entropy-based metric OSE (One-order Structural Entropy). Third, KEADA ranks classes in descending order according to their OSE values and selects a small number of classes as the key class candidates. In order to verify the effectiveness of our approach, we conducted experiments on three Java GUI software systems and compared them with seven state-of-the-art approaches. We used the Friedman test to evaluate all approaches, and the results demonstrate that our approach performs best in all software systems.     

Investigation Driven by Network Pharmacology on Potential Components and Mechanism of DGS,a Natural Vasoprotective Combination,for the Phytotherapy of Coronary Artery Disease

Phytotherapy offers obvious advantages in the intervention of Coronary Artery Disease (CAD), but it is difficult to clarify the working mechanisms of the medicinal materials it uses. DGS is a natural vasoprotective combination that was screened out in our previous research, yet its potential components and mechanisms are unknown. Therefore, in this study, HPLC-MS and network pharmacology were employed to identify the active components and key signaling pathways of DGS. Transgenic zebrafish and HUVECs cell assays were used to evaluate the effectiveness of DGS. A total of 37 potentially active compounds were identified that interacted with 112 potential targets of CAD. Furthermore, PI3K-Akt, MAPK, relaxin, VEGF, and other signal pathways were determined to be the most promising DGS-mediated pathways. NO kit, ELISA, and Western blot results showed that DGS significantly promoted NO and VEGFA secretion via the upregulation of VEGFR2 expression and the phosphorylation of Akt, Erk1/2, and eNOS to cause angiogenesis and vasodilation. The result of dynamics molecular docking indicated that Salvianolic acid C may be a key active component of DGS in the treatment of CAD. In conclusion, this study has shed light on the network molecular mechanism of DGS for the intervention of CAD using a network pharmacology-driven strategy for the first time to aid in the intervention of CAD.     

Simultaneous Determination of Six Immunosuppressants in Human Whole Blood by HPLC-MS/MS Using a Modified QuEChERS Method

A high-performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry method was established for the simultaneous determination of mycophenolic acid, mycophenolate mofetil, tacrolimus, rapamycin, everolimus and pimecrolimus in human whole blood by optimizing the QuEChERS (Quick, Easy, Cheap, Effective, Rugged, and Safe) preparation method. Whole blood was extracted into ethyl acetate, salted out with anhydrous magnesium sulfate, and purified with ethylenediamine-N-propyl silane adsorbent. The supernatant was evaporated under nitrogen until dry and finally reconstituted in methanol. Chromatographic separation was performed on an Agilent Poroshell 120 EC-C18 column in methanol (mobile phase A)-water (optimized for 0.1% acetic acid and 10 mM ammonium acetate, mobile phase B) at a 0.3 mL·min⁻¹ flow rate. Electrospray ionization and positive ion multiple reaction monitoring were used for detection. The time for of analysis was 13 min. The calibration curves range of tacrolimus, rapamycin, everolimus and pimecrolimus were in the range of 1–100 ng·mL⁻¹, mycophenolate mofetil in the range of 0.1–10 ng·mL⁻¹ and mycophenolic acid at 10–1000 ng·mL⁻¹. All correlation coefficients were >0.993. The coefficients of variation (CV, %) for inter-day and intra-day precision were less than 10%, while the spiked recoveries were in the range of 92.1% to 116%. Our method was rapid, sensitive, specific, and reproducible for the simultaneous determination of six immunosuppressants in human whole blood. Importantly, our approach can be used to monitor drug concentrations in the blood to facilitate disease treatment.     

Anisotropic Superconducting Properties of Kagome Metal CsV_3Sb_5

We systematically measure the superconducting(SC) and mixed state properties of high-quality CsV_3 Sb_5 single crystals with T_c～3.5 K.We find that the upper critical field H_(c2)(T) exhibits a large anisotropic ratio of H_(c2)~(ab)/H_(c2)~c～9 at zero temperature and fitting its temperature dependence requires a minimum two-band effective model.Moreover,the ratio of the lower critical field,H_(c1)~(ab)/H_(c1)~c,is also found to be larger than 1,which indicates that the in-plane energy dispersion is strongly renormalized near Fermi energy.Both H_(c1)(T) and SC diamagnetic signal are found to change little initially below T_c～3.5 K and then to increase abruptly upon cooling to a characteristic temperature of ～2.8 K.Furthermore,we identify a two-fold anisotropy of in-plane angular-dependent magnetoresistance in the mixed state.Interestingly,we find that,below the same characteristic T～2.8 K,the orientation of this two-fold anisotropy displays a peculiar twist by an angle of 60° characteristic of the Kagome geometry.Our results suggest an intriguing superconducting state emerging in the complex environment of Kagome lattice,which,at least,is partially driven by electron-electron correlation.     

流动注射停流-催化光度法测定环境水样中痕量Mn(Ⅱ)的研究

在碱性介质中,Mn(Ⅱ)对催化KIO4氧化镁试剂Ⅰ(对硝基苯偶氮间苯二酚)的褪色反应有显著作用。据此建立了测定痕量Mn(Ⅱ)的流动注射停流-催化光度法。优化了流动注射条件,Mn(Ⅱ)在2~10μg/L,10~160μg/L,160~1000μg/L范围内符合比尔定律,采样频率6样/h,检出限0.12μg/L,相对标准偏差(RSD)4.9%(n=6)。用于环境水样中Mn(Ⅱ)的检测,回收率为95.5%~102%。     

Synthesis of Halopyrazole Matrine Derivatives and Their Insecticidal and Fungicidal Activities

Matrine is a traditional botanical pesticide with a broad-spectrum biological activity that is widely applied in agriculture. Halopyrazole groups are successfully introduced to the C13 of matrine to synthesize eight new derivatives with a yield of 78–87%. The insecticidal activity results show that the introduction of halopyrazole groups can significantly improve the insecticidal activity of matrine on Plutella xylostella, Mythimna separata and Spodoptera frugiperda with a corrected mortality rate of 100%, which is 25–65% higher than matrine. The fungicidal activity results indicate that derivatives have a high inhibitory effect on Ceratobasidium cornigerum, Cibberella sanbinetti, Gibberrlla zeae and Collectot tichum gloeosporioides. Thereinto, 4-Cl-Pyr-Mat has the best result, with an inhibition rate of 23–33% higher than that of matrine. Therefore, the introduction of halogenated pyrazole groups can improve the agricultural activity of matrine.     

Cardiac-specific overexpression of Ndufs1 ameliorates cardiac dysfunction after myocardial infarction by alleviating mitochondrial dysfunction and apoptosis

Myocardial infarction (MI) is the leading cause of premature death among adults. Cardiomyocyte death and dysfunction of the remaining viable cardiomyocytes are the main pathological factors of heart failure after MI. Mitochondrial complexes are emerging as critical mediators for the regulation of cardiomyocyte function. However, the precise roles of mitochondrial complex subunits in heart failure after MI remain unclear. Here, we show that NADH:ubiquinone oxidoreductase core subunit S1 (Ndufs1) expression is decreased in the hearts of heart failure patients and mice with myocardial infarction. Furthermore, we found that cardiac-specific Ndufs1 overexpression alleviates cardiac dysfunction and myocardial fibrosis in the healing phase of MI. Our results demonstrated that Ndufs1 overexpression alleviates MI/hypoxia-induced ROS production and ROS-related apoptosis. Moreover, upregulation of Ndufs1 expression improved the reduced activity of complex I and impaired mitochondrial respiratory function caused by MI/hypoxia. Given that mitochondrial function and cardiomyocyte apoptosis are closely related to heart failure after MI, the results of this study suggest that targeting Ndufs1 may be a potential therapeutic strategy to improve cardiac function in patients with heart failure.Subject terms: Heart failure, Myocardial infarction, Myocardial infarction