Bimetallic aluminum complexes supported by bis(salicylaldimine) ligand: Synthesis,characterization and ring-opening polymerization of lactide

Two types of bifunctional bis(salicylaldimine) ligands (syn-L and anti-L) were designed and synthesized to support bimetallic aluminum complexes.Owing to the rigid anthracene skeleton,syn-L and anti-L successfully locked two Al centers in close proximity (syn-Al2) and far apart (anti-Al2),respectively.The distance between two Al centers in syn-Al2 was defined by X-ray diffraction as 6.665 (A),which is far shorter than that in anti-Al2.In the presence of stoichiometrical BnOH,syn-Al2 and anti-Al2 were both efficient for ring-opening polymerization (ROP) of rac-LA with the former being more active.In the presence of excess BnOH,syn-Al2 showed an efficient and immortal feature,consistent with high conversions,matched Mns,narrow molecular weight distributions and end group fidelity,while anti-Al2 had a much lower activity or even became entirely inactive due to rapid decomposition,indicated by in situ 1H-NMR experiments of A1 complexes with BnOH.     

Preparation of MnCo/MCM-41 catalysts with high performance for chlorobenzene combustion

MCM-41 was synthesized by a soft template technique. The specific surface area and pore volume of the MCM-41 were 805.9 m²/g and 0.795 cm³/g, respectively. MCM-41-supported manganese and cobalt oxide catalysts were prepared by an impregnation method. The energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy clearly confirmed the existence of Mn, Co, and O, which indicated the successful loading of the active components on the surface of MCM-41. The structure and function of the catalysts were changed by modulating the molar ratio of manganese to cobalt. The 10%MnCo(6:1)/MCM-41 (Mn/Co molar ratio is 6:1) catalyst displayed the best catalytic activity according to the activity evaluation experiments, and chlorobenzene (1000 ppm) was totally decomposed at 270 °C. The high activity correlated with a high dispersion of the oxides and was attributed to the exposure of more active sites, which was demonstrated by X-ray diffraction and high-resolution transmission electron microscopy. The strong interactions between MnO₂, Co₃O₄, MnCoO_x, and MCM-41 indicated that cobalt promoted the redox cycles of the manganese system. The bimetal-oxide-based catalyst showed better catalytic activity than that of the single metal oxide catalysts, which was further confirmed by H₂ temperature-programmed reduction. Chlorobenzene temperature-programmed desorption results showed that 10%MnCo(6:1)/MCM-41 had higher adsorption strength for chlorobenzene than that of single metal catalysts. And stronger adsorption was beneficial for combustion of chlorobenzene. Furthermore, 10%MnCo(6:1)/MCM-41 was not deactivated during a continuous reaction for 1000 h at 260 °C and displayed good resistance to water and benzene, which indicated that the catalyst could be used in a wide range of applications.     

Ion exchange membranes from poly(2,6-dimethyl-1,4-phenylene oxide) and related applications

Ion exchange membranes (IEMs) play a significant role in fields of energy and environment, for instance fuel cells, diffusion dialysis, electrodialysis, etc. The limited choice of commercially available IEMs has produced a strong demand of fabricating IEMs with improved properties via facile synthetic strategies over the past two decades. Poly(phenylene oxide) (PPO) is considered as a promising polymeric material for constructing practical IEMs, due to its advantages of good physicochemical properties, low manufacturing cost and easy post functionalization. In this review, we present the accumulated efforts in synthetic strategies towards diverse types of PPO-based IEMs. Relation between polymer structures and the resulted features is discussed in detail. Besides, applying IEMs from PPO and its derivatives in fuel cell, diffusion dialysis and electrodialysis is summarized and commented.     

Valency‐Controlled Framework Nucleic Acid Signal Amplifiers

Weak ligand–receptor recognition events are often amplified by recruiting multiple regulatory biomolecules to the action site in biological systems. However, signal amplification in in vitro biomimetic systems generally lack the spatiotemporal regulation in vivo. Herein we report a framework nucleic acid (FNA)‐programmed strategy to develop valence‐controlled signal amplifiers with high modularity for ultrasensitive biosensing. We demonstrated that the FNA‐programmed signal amplifiers could recruit nucleic acids, proteins, and inorganic nanoparticles in a stoichiometric manner. The valence‐controlled signal amplifier enhanced the quantification ability of electrochemical biosensors, and enabled ultrasensitive detection of tumor‐relevant circulating free DNA (cfDNA) with sensitivity enhancement of 3–5 orders of magnitude and improved dynamic range.     

Quantum Dynamics of Oxyhydrogen Complex-Forming Reactions for the HO2 and HO3 Systems

Complex-forming reactions widely exist in gas-phase chemical reactions.Various complexforming bimolecular reactions have been investigated and interesting phenomena have been discovered.The complex-forming reactions usually have small or no barrier in the entrance channel, which leads to obvious differences in kinetic and dynamic characteristics compared with direct reactions.Theoretically, quantum state-resolved reaction dynamics can provide the most detailed microscopic dynamic mechanisms and is now feasible for a direct reaction with only one potential barrier.However, it is of great challenge to construct accurate potential energy surfaces and perform accurate quantum dynamics calculations for a complex polyatomic reaction involving deep potential wells and multi-channels.This paper reviews the most recent progress in two prototypical oxyhydrogen complex-forming reaction systems, HO₂ and HO₃, which are significant in combustion, atmospheric, and interstellar chemistry.We will present a brief survey of both computational and experimental work and emphasize on some unsolved problems existing in these systems.     

Calabi–Yau varieties with semi-stable fibre structures

Motivated by the Strominger–Yau–Zaslow conjecture, we study Calabi–Yau varieties with semi-stable fibre structures. We use Hodge theory to study the higher direct images of wedge products of relative cotangent sheaves of certain semi-stable families over higher dimensional quasi-projective bases, and obtain some results on positivity. We then apply these results to study non-isotrivial Calabi–Yau varieties fibred by semi-stable Abelian varieties (or hyperkähler varieties).     

Method to determine enantiomeric excess of glucose by nonchiral high-performance liquid chromatography using circular dichroism detection

Using nonchiral high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) coupled with a circular dichroism (CD) detector, we developed a new method to determine the enantiomeric excess (e.e.) of glucose derivatized with chromophores (p-bromobenzoate). This method is suitable for microscale analysis of glycoside and saccharide. As an application of this method, the enantiomeric excess of the component glucose of a glucan was assayed.     

Reactivity of fullerene epoxide: preparation of fullerene-fused thiirane, tetrahydrothiazolidin-2-one, and 1,3-dioxolane

The epoxide moiety in the fullerene-mixed peroxide C60(O)(OOtBu)4 1 reacts readily with aryl isocyanates ArNCS (Ar = Ph, Naph) to form both the thiirane derivative C60(S)(OOtBu)4 and fullerene-fused tetrahydrothiazolidin-2-one. The reaction of 1 with trimethylsilyl isothiocyanate TMSNCS yields the isothiocyanate derivative C60(NCS)(OH)(OOtBu)4, the isothiocyanate and hydroxyl moieties of which could be converted to a fullerene-fused tetrahydrothiazolidin-2-one ring with alumina quantitatively. Treating 1 with BF3.Et2O yields the fullerene-fused [1,3,2]-dioxoborolane derivative C60(O2BOH)(OOtBu)4. In the presence of aldehyde or acetone, BF3.Et2O catalyzes the conversion of epoxide to fullerene-fused 1,3-dioxolane derivatives. The products are characterized by spectroscopic data. Two of the compounds are also characterized by single-crystal X-ray analysis.     

Nickel-catalyzed reactions of vinyl aziridines and aziridinylen-ynes

Ni/NHC was found to catalyze the rearrangement of vinyl aziridines and aziridinylen-ynes under mild conditions.     

Preparation and properties of gluten/calcium carbonate composites

Environment friendly thermosetting composites were prepared by blending wheat gluten （WG） as matrix, calcium carbonate （CaCO3） as filler and glycerol as plasticizer followed by compression molding the mixture at 120 ℃ to crosslink the WG matrix. Morphology observation showed that the CaCO3 particles were finely dispersed in matrix. Incorporation of CaCO3 up to 10 wt% into the composites caused Young＇s modulus and tensile strength to increase markedly. On the other hand, the moisture absorption and elongation at break decreased slightly.