Controlled Reactivity Tuning of Metal‐Functionalized Vanadium Oxide Clusters

Controlling the assembly and functionalization of molecular metal oxides [M_xO_y]^n? (M=Mo, W, V) allows the targeted design of functional molecular materials. While general methods exist that enable the predetermined functionalization of tungstates and molybdates, no such routes are available for molecular vanadium oxides. Controlled design of polyoxovanadates, however, would provide highly active materials for energy conversion, (photo‐) catalysis, molecular magnetism, and materials science. To this end, a new approach has been developed that allows the reactivity tuning of vanadium oxide clusters by selective metal functionalization. Organic, hydrogen‐bonding cations, for example, dimethylammonium are used as molecular placeholders to block metal binding sites within vanadate cluster shells. Stepwise replacement of the placeholder cations with reactive metal cations gives mono‐ and difunctionalized clusters. Initial reactivity studies illustrate the tunability of the magnetic, redox, and catalytic activity.     

Glucose content detection in aqueous solutions with near-infrared polarization spectrometry

The absorbance using diffuse reflectance in the polarization spectroscopy was expressed using the empirical expressions that fitted the Monte Carlo simulation results. The absorbance spectra of glucose solutions indicated that the partition among H₂O molecular species changed partly to the other ones depending on the glucose content. In saline water and phosphate-buffered saline water, there appears an action opposite to the transition in dissolution of glucose by the destruction of water species due to the presence of Na⁺ and Cl^? ions. The sensitivity of glucose concentration in them was found to be higher in the cross-polarization than in the parallel one owing to the increased travelling distance caused by multiscattering.