Synthesis of high surface area hydroxyapatite nanoparticles by mixed surfactant-mediated approach

A new surfactant-mediated approach was developed to synthesize hydroxyapatite (HAp) nanoparticles with high surface areas by calcination of their precursors encapsulated with calcium stearate using mixed surfactant-containing reaction mixtures. Acidic aqueous solution of calcium phosphate was mixed with both or either nonaoxyethylene dodecyl ether (C12EO9) and polyoxyethylene(20) sorbitan monostearate (Tween 60) and then was treated with aqueous ammonium at 25 degrees C. The C12EO9-based single surfactant system yielded an aggregate of platy HAp nanoparticles 20-40 nm in size, whereas the Tween 60-based single and mixed systems led to lath-shaped HAp nanoparticles 2-8 nm wide and encapsulated with calcium stearate. On calcination at 500 degrees C, the stearate-encapsulated HAp nanoparticles in the latter two systems were deorganized into high surface area HAp nanoparticles. Particularly, the HAp nanoparticles in the mixed system exhibited a specific surface area as high as 364 m2 g(-1) that is roughly 3 times larger than 160 m2 g(-1) for those in the single system. The significantly high surface area for the former is attributed to much less adhesion of decapsulated HAp nanoparticles, which originated from the particle-separating effect of the C12EO9 molecules adsorbed on the outer surface of the stearate-encapsulated HAp nanoparticles to inhibit their agglomeration or interfacial coordination. The present results demonstrate that the mixed use of two different surfactants as a source of encapsulating and templating agent and a particle-separating agent is specifically effective for the synthesis of high surface area HAp nanoparticles.     

Formation and thermal decomposition of pyridine intercalates of α- and γ-zirconium phosphates

The intercalation of pyridine into α-ZrP takes place with an accompanying uptake of one more mole of water to form a dihydrate Zr(HPO₄)_1.55(C₅H₅NHPO₄)_0.45 · 2 H₂O which has an interlayer spacing of 10.9 Å and contains two types of water with different thermostabilities. The pyridine intercalate of γ-ZrP with 12.3 Å spacing is formed by the replacement of interlayer water by the gest molecules without any appreciable change in interlayer spacing and its composition is Zr(HPO₄)_1.56 (C₅H₅NHPO₄)_0.44 · 0.7 H₂O. The α-intercalate undergoes dehydration at below 140°C, accompanied by its separation into a pyridine-free phase (ζ-ZrP) and a pyridine enriched one, and this dehydration is immediately followed by the desorption of pyridine, resulting in the overall conversion of the initial phase to ζ-ZrP. The γ-intercalate, on the other hand, releases its water without any phase separation at similar temperatures but its depyridination temperature at 250°C is about 110°C higher than that for the other. A molecular packing model is proposed to explain the interlayer spacings, compositions, and thermal decomposition properties of both intercalates.     

Characteristics of the Watson-Crick type hydrogen-bonded DNA base pairs: An ab initio molecular orbital study

Characteristics of the Watson-Crick-type hydrogen-bonded base pairs, thymine-adenine and cytosineguanine, are presented. These were established using an ab initio molecular orbital method. Base–base interactions are revealed to have dominant roles in the structures of nucleic acids and also in their functions. The most stable conformations in Watson-Crick-type base pairs are almost in accord with the structure observed in fiber X-ray diffraction study. Explanations are given of the origin of the sequencedependent local structures which differ from one base pair to the next, as observed in single-crystal X-ray analyses. In the case of the thymine-adenine base pair, it is shown that various geometrical parameters having almost the same stability are available. According to the propeller twist, the instability is not large enough for a base pair to be twisted readily.     

Formation of a novel electroactive film by electropolymerization of 5-amino-1-naphthol

The electrooxidation of 5-amino-1-naphthol in acetonitrile solutions led to the formation of a purplish gray, air-stable, polymeric film (poly(5-amino-1-naphthol), poly(5,1-ANT)), which presents a nonfibrillar morphology, on basal-plane pyrolytic graphite and In-Sn oxide conducting glass (ITO) electrodes. The film showed a reversible, well-defined oxidation-reduction response in both aqueous solutions of pH 1–13 and protic non-aqueous solutions, and was semiconducting. The formal redox potential (E^o') was 0.075 V vs. a sodium chloride saturated calomel electrode in 0.2 M NaClO₄ aqueous solution (pH 1.0). The pH dependence of (E^o') suggested that the electrode processes at pH 1-5 and pH 8–13 are 1e⁻ − 1H⁺and 1e^t- − 2 H⁺ reactions, respectively. The poly(5,1-ANT) film-coated ITO electrode displayed an electrochromic character: the oxidized form is purplish gray and the reduced one is pale brownish yellow. In addition, based on the electrochemical and IR absorption spectroscopic characterization of the film, some possible candidates for the structures of electroactive moieties of poly(5,1-ANT) are proposed.     

Bounds for the quasi-stationary distribution of some specialized Markov chains

The quasi-stationary distributions of Markov chains have been investigated by many papers and are known to have considerable practical importance in, e.g., biological, chemical and applied probability models. However, computation of the quasi-stationary distributions is often nontrivial, which has limited its use in practice despite the usefulness of its own, except for some simple cases. This paper develops some bounds, which are relatively easy to calculate, for the quasi-stationary distribution of some specialized Markov chains.     

American put options with a finite set of exercisable time epochs

The ordinary American put option assumes that investors can exercise their right at any time epoch. However, due to limitations in actual trades, they are not totally free to exercise in time. In this paper, motivated by this practical situation, we consider American put options with a finite set of exercisable time epochs. Assuming that the underlying stock price process follows a discrete-time Markov process, the put option premium is derived. It is shown that, as for the ordinary American put, the option premium is decomposed into the corresponding European put premium plus the early exercise premium under the stationary independent increments assumption. Moreover, the option premium converges to the ordinary American put premium from below as the number of exercisable time epochs increases under regularity conditions. Some lower bound of the option premium is also obtained.     

Polymer-immobilized lipoamides—iron(II) system as a reducing catalyst for the reduction of nitrobenzenes to anilines by sodium borohydride

Based on a redox function of 1,2-dithiolane ? 1,3-dithiol, lipoamide (LAm), and polymers having lipoamide structure were found to work as reducing catalysts for the reduction of p-substituted nitrobenzenes to corresponding anilines with sodium borohydride in the presence of ferrous chloride in ethanol. Polyallylamine having lipoamide structure (PAA—LAm) showed a good reactivity for the reduction and was easily separated from the reaction mixture.     

Decompositions of theM/M/1 transition function

Two decompositions are established for the probability transition function of the queue length process in the M/M/1 queue by a simple probabilistic argument. The transition function is expressed in terms of a zero-avoiding probability and a transition probability to zero in two different ways. As a consequence, the M/M/1 transition function can be represented as a positive linear combination of convolutions of the busy-period density. These relations provide insight into the transient behavior and facilitate establishing related results, such as inequalities and asymptotic behavior.     

An extension of the Wang transform derived from Bühlmann’s economic premium principle for insurance risk

It is well known that the Wang transform [Wang, S.S., 2002. A universal framework for pricing financial and insurance risks. Astin Bull. 32, 213–234] for the pricing of financial and insurance risks is derived from Bühlmann’s economic premium principle [Bühlmann, H., 1980. An economic premium principle. Astin Bull. 11, 52–60]. The transform is extended to the multivariate setting by [Kijima M., 2006. A multivariate extension of equilibrium pricing transforms: The multivariate Esscher and Wang transforms for pricing financial and insurance risks, Astin Bull. 36, 269–283]. This paper further extends the results to derive a class of probability transforms that are consistent with Bühlmann’s pricing formula. The class of transforms is extended to the multivariate setting by using a Gaussian copula, while the multiperiod extension is also possible within the equilibrium pricing framework.     

Self-organization of surfactant-metal-ion complex nanofibers on graphite surfaces and their application to fibrously concentrated platinum nanoparticle formation

We report the fabrication of self-organized surfactant nanofibers containing platinum ions on a highly oriented pyrolytic graphite (HOPG) surface from mixed solutions of hexadecyltrimethylammonium hydroxide (C16TAOH) and hydrogen hexachloroplatinate (IV) (H2PtCl6). The fibrous surfactant self-assembly was stable in air, even after being soaked in water, in contrast to surfactant hemicylindrical micelles, which are stable only at graphite/solution interfaces. The results show that the graphite surface served as an essential template for the specific formation of fibrous surfactant self-assemblies. In addition, when surfactant nanofibers containing metal ions were treated with hydrazine, platinum nanoparticles concentrated in the nanofibers formed on the HOPG surface. We also prepared surfactant nanofibers containing gold ions on HOPG surfaces and formed gold nanoparticles in the nanofibers.