Synthesis and spatial structure of new chiral dopants from allobetuline series for cholesteric liquid-crystal compositions

Structural Chemistry - New series of chiral dopants for cholesteric liquid-crystal compositions were synthesized on the base of 2-substituted allobetuline derivatives, and their steric structure...     

Production of radially and azimuthally polarized polychromatic beams

We describe a system that efficiently provides radially or azimuthally polarized radiation from a randomly polarized source. It is constructed from two conical reflectors and a cylindrical sheet of polarizing film. Envisaged applications include a microscope illuminator for high-resolution surface plasmon resonance microscopy, illumination for high-resolution microlithography, and efficient coupling of a laser source to hollow optical fibers. The angular coherence function of light polarized by the device was measured to evaluate its usefulness for these applications.     

Image quality and diagnostic performance of silicone-specific breast MRI

Purpose

To compare the image quality of three techniques and diagnostic performance in detecting implant rupture.

Materials and Methods

The study included 161 implants for the evaluation of image quality, composed of water-saturated short TI inversion recovery (herein called “water-sat STIR”), three-point Dixon techniques (herein called “Dixon”), and short TI inversion recovery fast spin-echo with iterative decomposition of silicone and water using least-squares approximation (herein called “STIR IDEAL”) and included 41 implants for the evaluation of diagnostic performance in detecting rupture, composed of water-sat STIR and STIR IDEAL.Six image quality categories were evaluated and three classifications were used: normal implant, possible rupture, and definite rupture.

Results

Statistically significant differences were noted for the image quality categories (p < 0.001). STIR IDEAL was superior or equal to water-sat STIR in all image quality categories except artifact effects and superior to Dixon in all categories. Water-sat STIR performed the poorest for water suppression uniformity.The sensitivity and specificity in detecting implant rupture of STIR-IDEAL were 81.8 % and 77.8 % and the difference between two techniques was not statistically significant.

Conclusion

STIR-IDEAL is a useful silicone-specific imaging technique demonstrating more robust water suppression and equivalent diagnostic accuracy for detecting implant rupture, than water-sat STIR, at the cost of longer scan time and an increase in minor motion artifacts.     

High-speed electro-optic control of the optical quality factor of a silicon microcavity

We demonstrate electro-optic ultrafast control of the optical quality factor of an on-chip silicon microcavity. The micrometer-sized cavity is formed by light confinement between two microring resonators acting as frequency selective mirrors. The ring resonators are integrated into p-i-n junctions enabling ultrafast injection and extraction of carriers. We show tuning of the cavity quality factor from 20,000 to 6,000 in under 100 ps. We demonstrate both high-Q to low-Q and low-Q to high-Q transitions.     

Inducing photonic transitions between discrete modes in a silicon optical microcavity

We show the existence of direct photonic transitions between modes of a silicon optical microcavity spaced apart in wavelength by over 8 nm. This is achieved by using ultrafast tuning of the refractive index of the cavity over a time interval that is comparable to the inverse of the frequency separation of modes. The demonstrated frequency mixing effect, i.e., the transitions between the modes, would enable on-chip silicon comb sources which can find wide applications in optical sensing, precise spectroscopy, and wavelength-division multiplexing for optical communications and interconnects.     

A thickness transition in evaporating water films

When a thin water film evaporates from a clean cleaved mica substrate, two films of different thickness can coexist, one of them being stable and the other metastable. As the evaporation proceeds, a phase transition occurs between them. The edge between the two films becomes unstable and the patterns which develop are reminiscent of diffusion-limited solidification. Experimental results and a theory are presented. The theory suggests that remaining drops evaporate in an unusual manner, whereby the largest drops evaporate fastest, and also shows how the instability in a linear edge coarsens. These predictions were confirmed.     

A facile one-pot highly chemo- and regioselective synthesis of the novel heterocyclic system indolo[1,2-c]azolo[1,5-a]quinazoline-8,10-dione

A series of novel indolo[1,2-c]azolo[1,5-a]quinazoline-8,10-diones was obtained by a multi-component reaction between cyclic 1,3-diketones, α-aminoazoles, and glyoxal. The unexpected cyclization process was established by NMR spectroscopy and X-ray diffraction measurements.     

Cyclocondensation of 3-Amino-1,2,4-triazoles with Esters of Substituted Cinnamic Acids and Aromatic Unsaturated Ketones

We have studied the reactions of 3-amino, 3,5-diamino-, and 3-amino-5-trifluoromethyl-1,2,4-triazole with esters of substituted cinnamic acids and aromatic unsaturated ketones; we have established the directionality of formation of the tetrahydrooxopyrimidine ring. We have carried out hydrolysis and hydrazinolysis of 7-phenyl-4,5,6,7-tetrahydro-1,2,4-triazolo[1,5-a]pyrimidin-5-one. We have conducted an X-ray diffraction study of isopropylidene hydrazide of 3-(5-amino-1,2,4-triazol-1-yl)-3-phenylpropionic acid.