Electrophile-driven copper-catalyzed one-pot synthesis of 3-halogen quinoline derivatives

A convenient and regioselective one-pot synthesis of 3-chloride or 3-bromide quinoline derivatives was achieved through a Grignard addition reaction by alkynyl Grignard regent to o-trifluoroacetyl aniline and a Cu(II)-catalyzed cyclization–halogenation tandem reaction with aqueous HCl or HBr as electrophilic reagent.     

Excitation functions of neutrons induced reactions on terbium from threshold to 20 MeV

Cross-sections for (n,2n), (n,p), and (n,α) reactions have been measured on terbium isotopes at the neutron energies from 13.5 to 14.8 MeV using the activation technique in combination with high-resolution gamma-ray spectroscopy. Data are reported for the following reactions: ¹⁵⁹Tb(n,2n)^158m+gTb, ¹⁵⁹Tb(n,p)¹⁵⁹Gd, and ¹⁵⁹Tb(n,α)¹⁵⁶Eu. The cross sections were also estimated with the TALYS-1.4 nuclear model code, at neutron energies varying from the reaction threshold to 20 MeV. The results were discussed and compared with experimental data found in the literature, and with the comprehensive evaluation data in ENDF/B-VII.1 and JENDL-4.0 libraries.     

Extraction kinetics of Uranium(VI) and Thorium(IV) with Tri-iso-amyl phosphate from nitric acid using a Lewis Cell

The extraction kinetics of uranium(VI) and thorium(IV) with Tri-iso-amyl phosphate (TiAP) from nitric acid medium has been investigated using a Lewis Cell. Especially, dependences of the extraction rate on stirring speed, temperature, interfacial area were firstly measured to elucidate the extraction kinetics regimes. The experimental results demonstrated that extraction kinetic of U(VI) is governed by chemical reactions at interface with an activation energy, E_a, of 43.41 kJ/mol, while the rate of Th(IV) extraction is proved to be intermediate controlled, of which the E_a is 23.20 kJ/mol. Reaction orders with respect to the influencing parameters of the extraction rate are determined, and the rate equations of U(VI) and Th(IV) at 293 K have been proposed as $$ {\text{r}} = - {\text{dcUO}}_{ 2} \left( {{\text{NO}}_{ 3} } \right)_{ 2} /{\text{dt}} = 1. 80 \times 10^{ - 3} \left[ {{\text{UO}}_{ 2} \left( {{\text{NO}}_{ 3} } \right)_{ 2} } \right]^{ 1.0 1} \left[ {\text{TiAP}} \right]^{0. 5 5} , $$ $$ {\text{r}} = - {\text{dcTh }}\left( {{\text{NO}}_{ 3} } \right)_{ 4} /{\text{dt}} = 1. 8 8\times 10^{ - 3} \left[ {{\text{Th }}\left( {{\text{NO}}_{ 3} } \right)_{ 4} } \right]^{ 1.0 4} \left[ {\text{TiAP}} \right]^{ 1. 7 7} \left[ {{\text{HNO}}_{ 3} } \right]^{0. 3 8} , $$ respectively.     

Self-calibration method for cerium-doped lanthanum bromide scintillator detector in the 0.1–2.0 MeV energy range

In recent years, the cerium-doped lanthanum bromide, LaBr₃ (Ce = 5 %) detector is increasingly playing an important role in radiation measurements because of its higher energy resolution (~3 % at 662 keV), faster luminescence decay time (~35 ns) and higher detection efficiency compared to 7.65 cm × 7.65 cm NaI(Tl) detector. Intrinsic spectra between 1,800 and 3,000 keV derived from internal radioactivity within LaBr₃(Ce) scintillators have been investigated in some literatures, and these results are confirmed by the experiments in this work. In this paper, a new method for LaBr₃(Ce) detector energy calibration from 100 to 2,000 keV is proposed using the intrinsic spectra (self-calibration) instead of the standard gamma sources. Proof-of-concept experiment results show that self-calibration can guarantee energy accuracy of better than 0.815 % and can be applied outside the laboratory. The stability and applicability of this method are also investigated systematically.     

室温下铜催化制备含羰基或酯基的喹唑啉-4(3H)-亚基类衍生物

在室温的条件下,建立了一种简单实用的铜催化制备含酮羰基或酯基的喹唑啉-4(3H)-亚基类衍生物的新方法.实验证明以2-溴苯甲酰乙酸甲酯类似物及脒盐酸盐为原料,碘化亚铜为催化剂,磷酸钾为碱,无添加配体的情况下,可成功制备一系列喹唑啉类衍生物.其结构均经1H NMR、13C NMR及HRMS确证.     

Development of a solid‐phase microextraction fiber by the chemical binding of graphene oxide on a silver‐coated stainless‐steel wire with an ionic liquid as the crosslinking agent

Graphene oxide was bonded onto a silver‐coated stainless‐steel wire using an ionic liquid as the crosslinking agent by a layer‐by‐layer strategy. The novel solid‐phase microextraction fiber was characterized by scanning electron microscopy, energy‐dispersive X‐ray spectroscopy and Raman microscopy. A multilayer graphene oxide layer was closely coated onto the supporting substrate. The thickness of the coating was about 4 μm. Coupled with gas chromatography, the fiber was evaluated using five polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (fluorene, anthracene, fluoranthene, 1,2‐benzophenanthrene, and benzo(a)pyrene) as model analytes in direct‐immersion mode. The main conditions (extraction time, extraction temperature, ionic strength, and desorption time) were optimized by a factor‐by‐factor optimization. The as‐established method exhibited a wide linearity range (0.5–200 μg/L) and low limits of determination (0.05–0.10 μg/L). It was applied to analyze environmental water samples of rain and river water. Three kinds of the model analytes were quantified and the recoveries of samples spiked at 10 μg/L were in the range of 92.3–120 and 93.8–115%, respectively. The obtained results indicated the fiber was efficient for solid‐phase microextraction analysis.     

Rapid assessment of drug response in cancer cells using microwell array and molecular imaging

Selection of personalized chemotherapy regimen for individual patients has significant potential to improve chemotherapy efficacy and to reduce the deleterious effects of ineffective chemotherapy drugs. In this study, a rapid and high-throughput in vitro drug response assay was developed using a combination of microwell array and molecular imaging. The microwell array provided high-throughput analysis of drug response, which was quantified based on the reduction in intracellular uptake (2-[N-(7-nitrobenz-2-oxa-1,3-diazol-4-yl)amino]-2-deoxy-d-glucose) (2-NBDG). Using this synergistic approach, the drug response measurement was completed within 4 h, and only a couple thousand cells were needed for quantification. The broader application of this microwell molecular imaging approach was demonstrated by evaluating the drug response of two cancer cell lines, cervical (HeLa) and bladder (5637) cancer cells, to two distinct classes of chemotherapy drugs (cisplatin and paclitaxel). This approach did not require an extended cell culturing period, and the quantification of cellular drug response was 4–16 times faster compared with other cell-microarray drug response studies. Moreover, this molecular imaging approach had comparable sensitivity to traditional cell viability assays, i.e., the MTT assay and propidium iodide labeling of cellular nuclei;and similar throughput results as flow cytometry using only 1,000–2,000 cells. Given the simplicity and robustness of this microwell molecular imaging approach, it is anticipated that the assay can be adapted to quantify drug responses in a wide range of cancer cells and drugs and translated to clinical settings for a rapid in vitro drug response using clinically isolated samples.      

Development and validation of an ELISA kit for the detection of ricin toxins from biological specimens and environmental samples

Ricin is a toxin that can be easily extracted from seeds of Ricinus communis plants. Ricin is considered to be a major bio-threat as it can be freely and easily acquired in large quantities. A deliberate release of such toxin in civilian populations would very likely overwhelm existing public health systems, resulting in public fear and social unrest. There is currently no commercially available or FDA-approved prophylaxis such as vaccines, or therapeutic antitoxins or antidotes, available for ricin intoxication. Patient treatment is typically supportive care based on symptoms, often designed to reinforce the body’s natural response. This paper describes the development and validation of a robust ELISA test kit, which can be used to screen for ricin in biological specimens such as whole blood and faeces. Faecal specimens are shown in this study to have better diagnostic sensitivity and a wider diagnostic window compared to whole blood. From these results, it is concluded that faeces is the most suitable clinical specimen for diagnosis of ricin poisoning via the oral route. The ELISA test kit can also detect ricin in environmental samples. An advantage of this ELISA kit over other commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) detection kits currently on the market that are developed to screen environmental samples only is its ability to diagnose ricin poisoning from clinical specimens as well as detect ricin from environmental samples.     

Tissue imaging and serum lipidomic profiling for screening potential biomarkers of thyroid tumors by matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization-Fourier transform ion cyclotron resonance mass spectrometry

Changes in serum lipidome and in tissue lipidome are associated with cancer. In this study, tissue mass spectrometry imaging (MSI) and serum lipid profiling by matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization-Fourier transform ion cyclotron resonance mass spectrometry (MALDI-FTICR MS) were performed to investigate significantly changed lipids in both tumor (malignant thyroid cancer (MTC) and benign thyroid tumor (BTT)) tissues and sera. Y-scatterplots of variable importance in the projection (VIP) values vs. fold change values indicate that change trends in the levels of ten lipids (i.e., phosphatidylcholine (PC)(34:1), PC(36:1), PC(38:6), phosphatidic acid (PA) (36:2), PA(36:3), PA(38:3), PA(38:4), PA(38:5), PA(40:5), and sphingomyelin (SM)(34:1)) in both tissues and sera from MTC patients, BTT patients, and normal individuals are significantly associated with these three types of pathophysiological status. In order to examine their diagnostic ability, 289 serum samples from 124 MTC patients, 43 BTT patients, and 122 normal controls were randomly divided into the training set and validation set. A biomarker of PC(34:1) exhibited excellent diagnostic ability to differentiate both MTC and BTT patients from normal individuals, with an area under the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve value of 0.984, a sensitivity of 96.4 %, and a specificity of 92.7 %. A panel which included PA(36:3) and SM(34:1) could distinguish between MTC and BTT, with an area under receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC) of 0.961, a sensitivity of 87.8 %, and a specificity of 92.9 %. It is worth noting that a panel consisting of PC(34:1), PA(36:3), and SM(34:1) could differentiate MTC patients from both BTT patients and normal individuals, with an AUC of 0.841, a sensitivity of 86.6 %, and a specificity of 75.5 %.