Variation of ursolic acid content in eight Ocimum species from northeastern Brazil

Ursolic acid is a very important compound due to its biological potential as an anti-inflammatory, trypanocidal, antirheumatic, antiviral, antioxidant and antitumoral agent. This study presents the HPLC analysis of ursolic acid (UA) content in eight different Ocimum species: O. americanum L., O. basilicum L, O. basilicum var purpurascens Benth, O. basilicum var. minimum L, O. gratissimum L, O. micranthum Willd, O. selloi Benth. and O. tenuiflorum L. grown in Northeastern Brazil. In these Ocimum species, UA was detected in different yields, with O. tenuiflorum showing the highest content (2.02%). This yield is very significant when compared with other sources of UA.     

On some constructive aspects of monogenic function theory in ℝ4

As is well known, a possible generalization to ?⁴ of the classical Cauchy–Riemann system leads to the so‐called Riesz system. The main goal of this paper is to construct explicitly a complete orthonormal system of polynomial solutions of this system with respect to a certain inner product. This will be done in the spaces of square integrable functions on the unit ball over ?. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Thermogravimetric study of aerobic biodegradation of sanitary sewage sludge and lubricating oil

The present study describes the aerobic biodegradation process of a mixture of sanitary sewage sludge and lubricating oil. TG/DTG curves confirmed that the applied aerobic biological treatment decreased the organic material content and caused significant modifications in the thermal behavior of the studied substrates after the functioning period.     

Screening of Food Grade Lipases to be Used in Esterification and Interesterification Reactions of Industrial Interest

Seven food grade commercially available lipases were immobilized by covalent binding on polysiloxane–polyvinyl alcohol (POS-PVA) hybrid composite and screened to mediate reactions of industrial interest. The synthesis of butyl butyrate and the interesterification of tripalmitin with triolein were chosen as model reactions. The highest esterification activity (240.63 μM/g min) was achieved by Candida rugosa lipase, while the highest interesterification yield (31%, in 72 h) was achieved by lipase from Rhizopus oryzae, with the production of about 15 mM of the triglycerides C₅₀ and C₅₂. This lipase also showed a good performance in butyl butyrate synthesis, with an esterification activity of 171.14 μM/g min. The results demonstrated the feasibility of using lipases from C. rugosa for esterification and R. oryzae lipase for both esterification and interesterification reactions.     

Borel–Carathéodory Type Theorem for Monogenic Functions

In this paper we give a generalization of the classical Borel–Carathéodory theorem in complex analysis to higher dimensions in the framework of Quaternionic Analysis. Submitted: November 14, 2007., Revised: February 25, 2008.     

Evaluation of biodiesel-diesel blends quality using H NMR and chemometrics

In this work, the use of ¹H NMR spectroscopy and statistical approach to the evaluation of biodiesel-diesel blends quality is described. Forty-six mixtures of oil-diesel, biodiesel-diesel, and oil-biodiesel-diesel were analyzed by ¹H NMR and such data were employed to design four predictive models. Thirty-six mixtures were used in the calibration set and the others in the validation. The PCR and PLS models were evaluated through statistical parameters.Briefly, PLS and PCR models were suitable for the prediction of biodiesel and oil concentration in mineral diesel. Specially, in higher concentration the predicted values were quite similar to the real ones. This fact was evidenced by the low relative errors of high concentrated samples; this means that the prediction of low concentrated samples will probably show high deviation. Therefore, ¹H NMR-PLS and ¹H NMR-PCR methods are fairly useful for the quality control of biodiesel-diesel blends, particularly they are suitable for prediction of concentrations greater than 2%.     

A kinetic study of the thermal decomposition of mesoionic compounds within scope of its application in nonlinear optical devices

The mesoionic compounds are pentagonal heterocyclic betaines with their potential use mainly in the pharmacology field due to the diversity of their biological activities. Their exceptional electric properties lead the compounds to be investigated in the field such as the nonlinear optical devices. In this study, five mesoionic compounds of the 1,3-thiazole-5-thiolate system had been synthesized from amino acids derived from glycine through 1,3-dipolar cycloaddition/cycloreversion reaction. The compounds were characterized by the use of infrared spectrometry, thermogravimetry and differential scanning calorimetry techniques. Thermal stability of each structure was determined and characterized by the kinetic study of the thermal decomposition by non-isothermal thermogravimetry. The DSC curves for MI-1, MI-2, MI-3, MI-4, and MI-5 demonstrated their fusion and subsequent decomposition with the exception of MI-3, which presented only decomposition stages. The kinetic models that better described the thermal decomposition mechanism of the mesoionic compounds achieved by the non-isothermal methods were R1, R2 and R3 (based on the geometric models).     

Thermal characterization of indinavir sulfate using TG,DSC and DSC-photovisual

The object of the present work is to study the thermal characteristics of indinavir sulfate and to evaluate the quality of the raw materials. Indinavir A, B, C and reference samples were obtained from different suppliers and submitted to TG, DSC and DSC-photovisual analyses. TG/DTG curves indicated a desolvation and dehydration processes and were confirmed by DSC. According to the DSC curves the fusion took place at about 141–142°C for indinavir C and Reference sample B and about 146–149°C for the others. DSC-photovisual showed insoluble raw materials for indinavir C at 160°C. Indinavir sulfate is highly hygroscopic drug which requires attention during storage and manufacture by pharmaceutical industry.     

Calcined sludge sintering evaluation by heating microscopy thermal analysis

Aiming the use of the sewage sludge produced in one of the largest Brazilian wastewater treatment stations as a raw material for the ceramic industry, the sintering process of the ashes produced from its calcination was evaluated by heating microscopy thermal analysis (HMTA). From the microprocessed images, a method was developed to obtain HMTA dimensional change curves as a function of temperature, equivalent to those usually obtained from dilatometers or by thermomechanical analysis (TMA). The final product after sintering at 1050°C, characterized by X-ray fluorescence spectrometry, scanning electron microscopy and X-ray dispersive energy, indicates the presence of a vitreous phase containing phosphorus, which explains the good sintering properties of the studied calcined sludge, as shown from its HMTA dimensional change curve.