Morphological,thermal, and conductivity studies of poly(methyl methacrylate)/polyaniline dodecylbenzenesulfonate blends

Soluble in organic solvent polyaniline (PANI) was prepared using DBSA as a functional dopant. Miscibility was maximized for PMMA with hydroquinone. Transmission electron micrographs showed lowest level of phase separation. Thermal studies by differential scanning calorimetry show some peak shifts which indicate the miscibility of two polymers. The formations of new bonds are also confirmed by Fourier transformation infrared spectroscopy. Electroconductivity increased with increase of content of doped PAN1, showing percolation threshold at 3 wt %.     

Modules in Which Every Fully Invariant Submodule is Essential in a Direct Summand

A module M is called extending if every submodule of M is essential in a direct summand. We call a module FI-extending if every fully invariant submodule is essential in a direct summand. Initially we develop basic properties in the general module setting. For example, in contrast to extending modules, a direct sum of FI-extending modules is FI-extending. Later we largely focus on the specific case when a ring is FI-extending (considered as a module over itself). Again, unlike the extending property, the FI-extending property is shown to carry over to matrix rings. Several results on ring direct decompositions of FI-extending rings are obtained, including a proper generalization of a result of C. Faith on the splitting-off of the maximal regular ideal in a continuous ring.     

A Facile Method to Prepare Double‐Layer Isoporous Hollow Fiber Membrane by In Situ Hydrogen Bond Formation in the Spinning Line

A double‐layer hollow fiber is fabricated where an isoporous surface of polystyrene‐block‐poly(4‐vinylpyridine) is fixed on a support layer by co‐extrusion. Due to the sulfonation of the support layer material, delamination of the two layers is suppressed without increasing the number of subsequent processing steps for isoporous composite membrane formation. Electron microscope‐energy‐dispersive X‐ray spectroscopy images unveil the existence of a high sulfur concentration in the interfacial region by which in‐process H‐bond formation between the layers is evidenced. For the very first time, our study reports a facile method to fabricate a sturdy isoporous double‐layer hollow fiber.

     

Can a dipole-bound electron form a pseudo-atom? An atoms-in-molecules study of the hydrated electron

Non-nuclear local maxima, or attractors, of electron density are a rare but very interesting feature of the electron density distribution in molecules and solids. Recently, non-nuclear attractors (NNAs) and the corresponding pseudoatoms of electron density have been identified with the quantum theory of atoms in molecules for some anionic clusters formed by several polar solvent molecules and an excess electron bound in either a solvated-electron or dipole-bound fashion. This contribution reports a detailed study of the topology of the electron density for a series of dipole-bound water cluster anions, as calculated with Hartree-Fock, M?ller-Plesset perturbation theory, and coupled-cluster methods together with basis sets augmented with extra diffuse basis functions to accommodate the excess electron. For dipole-bound clusters, electron densities obtained with insufficient inclusion of electron correlation effects and tight basis sets feature a well-pronounced pseudoatom due to the excess electron, which ultimately disappears when a higher level of electronic structure theory and a more diffuse basis set are used. On the other hand, for solvated-electron clusters, where the excess electron is surrounded by solvent molecules, the existence of NNAs does not seem to be an artifact of the method employed, but rather a genuine feature of the electron density distribution. Pseudoatoms of electron density thus appear to be an exclusive feature of confined environments and are unlikely to be found on the tip of a cluster dipole or on solid surfaces.     

Comparison of luminescence ADP production assay and radiometric scintillation proximity assay for Cdc7 kinase

Several assay technologies have been successfully adapted and used in HTS to screen for protein kinase inhibitors; however, emerging comparative analysis studies report very low hit overlap between the different technologies, which challenges the working assumption that hit identification is not dependent on the assay method of choice. To help address this issue, we performed two screens on the cancer target, Cdc7-Dbf4 heterodimeric protein kinase, using a direct assay detection method measuring [(33)P]-phosphate incorporation into the substrate and an indirect method measuring residual ADP production using luminescence. We conducted the two screens under similar conditions, where in one, we measured [(33)P]-phosphate incorporation using scintillation proximity assay (SPA), and in the other, we detected luminescence signal of the ATP-dependent luciferase after regenerating ATP from residual ADP (LUM). Surprisingly, little or no correlation were observed between the positives identified by the two methods; at a threshold of 30% inhibition, 25 positives were identified in the LUM screen whereas the SPA screen only identified two positives, Tannic acid and Gentian violet, with Tannic acid being common to both. We tested 20 out of the 25 positive compounds in secondary confirmatory study and confirmed 12 compounds including Tannic acid as Cdc7-Dbf4 kinase inhibitors. Gentian violet, which was only positive in the SPA screen, inhibited luminescence detection and categorized as a false positive. This report demonstrates the strong impact in detection format on the success of a screening campaign and the importance of carefully designed confirmatory assays to eliminate those compounds that target the detection part of the assay.     

On the Schröder–Bernstein property for modules

The well known Schröder–Bernstein Theorem states that any two sets with one to one maps into each other are isomorphic. The question of whether any two (subisomorphic or) direct summand subisomorphic algebraic structures are isomorphic, has long been of interest. Kaplansky asked whether direct summands subisomorphic abelian groups are always isomorphic? The question generated a great deal of interest. The study of this question for the general class of modules has been somewhat limited. We extend the study of this question for modules in this paper. We say that a module Msatisfies the Schröder–Bernstein property (S-B property) if any two direct summands of M which are subisomorphic to direct summands of each other, are isomorphic. We show that a large number of classes of modules satisfy the S-B property. These include the classes of quasi-continuous, directly finite, quasi-discrete and modules with ACC on direct summands. It is also shown that over a Noetherian ring R, every extending module satisfies the S-B property. Among applications, it is proved that the class of rings R for which every R-module satisfies the S-B property is precisely that of pure-semisimple rings. We show that over a commutative domain R, any two quasi-continuous subisomorphic R-modules are isomorphic if and only if R is a PID. We study other conditions related to the S-B property and obtain characterizations of certain classes of rings via those conditions. Examples which delimit and illustrate our results are provided.     

AnomalousK-conversion coefficient of the 124keV transition in131Cs

The absoluteK-conversion coefficients of the 496 keV-124 keV cascadeγ-rays in¹³¹Cs have been determined from angular correlation experiments using a new approach. The value ofα _K =0.0100±0.0007 obtained for the 496 keV transition is in excellent agreement with the theory whereas a strong case is presented for the existence of an anomalous nuclear-structure-dependent conversion coefficient for the 124 keV transition. TheK-conversion coefficient for this transition has been measured to be 0.742±0.077 giving a value of 1.25±0.13 for the ratioα _K ^(expet) /α _K ^(theory) . The result is interpreted as being due to the presence of electric monopole,E0, electron transition. A value of 0.26±0.14 has been obtained for theE0/E2 electron conversion ratio and the absolute value of the electric monopole matrix element has been determined to be 0.07±0.02.