Aqueous Electrochemical Reduction of Carbon Dioxide and Carbon Monoxide into Methanol with Cobalt Phthalocyanine

Conversion of CO₂ into valuable molecules is a field of intensive investigation with the aim of developing scalable technologies for making fuels using renewable energy sources. While electrochemical reduction into CO and formate are approaching industrial maturity, a current challenge is obtaining more reduced products like methanol. However, literature on the matter is scarce, and even more for the use of molecular catalysts. Here, we demonstrate that cobalt phthalocyanine, a well‐known catalyst for the electrochemical conversion of CO₂ to CO, can also catalyze the reaction from CO₂ or CO to methanol in aqueous electrolytes at ambient conditions of temperature and pressure. The studies identify formaldehyde as a key intermediate and an unexpected pH effect on selectivity. This paves the way for establishing a sequential process where CO₂ is first converted to CO which is subsequently used as a reactant to produce methanol. Under ideal conditions, the reaction shows a global Faradaic efficiency of 19.5 % and chemical selectivity of 7.5 %.     

Nitric oxide binding and photodelivery based on ruthenium(II) complexes of 4-arylazo-3,5-dimethylpyrazole

Two fluorescent ligands, 3,5-dimethyl-4-(6'-sulfonylammonium-1'-azonaphthyl)pyrazole (dmpzn, 1) and 3,5-dimethyl-4-(4'-N,N'-dimethylaminoazophenyl)pyrazole (dmpza, 2) were obtained by condensation of ketoenolic derivatives with hydrazine. 1 and 2 formed the novel dinuclear complexes [(H(2)O)(3)ClRu(micro-L)(2)RuCl(H(2)O)(3)] (3 or 4) and [(H(2)O)(NO)Cl(2)Ru(micro-L)(2)RuCl(2)(NO)(H(2)O)] (6 or 7) (where L 1 = 2 or , respectively) which were characterized by IR, NMR and elemental analysis. The nitrosyl complexes were prepared by bubbling purified nitric oxide through methanol solutions of the corresponding ruthenium(II) chloroderivative or by reaction of the appropriate ligands with Ru(NO)Cl(3). Complexes 3 and 4 were found to bind NO, resulting in an increase in fluorescence. Ligand 1 also formed the mononuclear nitrosyl complex [Ru(NO)(bpy)(2)(dmpzn)]Cl(2) (8) which released NO in water at physiological pH and in the solid state as revealed by fluorescence and IR measurements, respectively.     

Synthesis and reactivity of functionalized bridged m-xylylenedioxycalix[6]arenes

The synthesis of A,D-m-xylylene-bridged calix[6]arenes 1-8 functionalized at position 5 of the spacer arm is described. The cone conformation of the new bridged calix[6]arenes has been established by (1)H and (13)C NMR. The X-ray structure of compound 6 confirmed the cone conformation also in the solid state. Compounds 9 and 10, which are branched-like structures, were obtained by reductive amination of 5-amino-A,D-m-xylylene-bridged-B,C,E,F-tetra-O-ethylcalix[6]arene 7 with diformyl calix[4]arene and CTV derivatives 22 and 24, respectively.     

Homological Systems in Triangulated Categories

We introduce the notion of homological systems Θ for triangulated categories. Homological systems generalize, on one hand, the notion of stratifying systems in module categories, and on the other hand, the notion of exceptional sequences in triangulated categories. We prove that, attached to the homological system Θ, there are two standardly stratified algebras A and B, which are derived equivalent. Furthermore, it is proved that the category \(\mathfrak {F}({\Theta }),\) of the Θ-filtered objects in a triangulated category \(\mathcal {T},\) admits in a very natural way a structure of an exact category, and then there are exact equivalences between the exact category \(\mathfrak {F}({\Theta })\) and the exact categories of the Δ-good modules associated to the standardly stratified algebras A and B. Some of the obtained results can be seen also under the light of the cotorsion pairs in the sense of Iyama-Nakaoka-Yoshino (see 6.6 and 6.7 ). We recall that cotorsion pairs are studied extensively in relation with cluster tilting categories, t-structures and co-t-structures.     

Dielectrophoretic manipulation of fluorescing single-walled carbon nanotubes

We investigate the behavior of fluorescing single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs) under dielectrophoretic conditions and demonstrate their collection with fluorescence microscopy. SWCNTs are dispersed in water with the aid of a nonionic surfactant, Triton X-100, and labeled through noncovalent binding with the dye 3,3'-dihexyloxacarbocyanine iodide (diOC(6)). The chromophore's affinity to the SWCNTs is due to pi-stacking interactions. Carbon nanotube (CNT) localization is clearly identified on the fluorescence images, showing that the nanotubes concentrate between the electrodes and align along the electric field lines.