Effect of solvent upon CH...O hydrogen bonds with implications for protein folding

The series of CH...O bonds formed between CF(n)H(4-n) (n = 0-3) and water are studied by quantum calculations under vacuum and in various solvents, including aqueous environment. The results are compared with the OH...O bond of the water dimer in the same solvents. Increasing polarity of the solvent leads in all cases to a lessening of the H-bond interaction energy, in a uniform fashion such that the CH...O bonds all remain weaker than OH...O in any solvent. These H-bond weakenings are coupled to a shortening of the inter-subunit separation. The contraction of the covalent CH bond to the bridging proton is reduced as the solvent becomes more polar, and the blue shift of its stretching vibration is likewise diminished. A process is considered that simulates protein folding by starting from a pair of noninteracting subunits in aqueous solvent and then goes to a H-bonded pair within the confines of a protein environment. This process is found to be energetically more favorable for some of the CH...O H-bonds than for the nominally stronger conventional OH...O H-bond. This finding suggests that CH...O bonds can make important energetic contributions to protein folding, on par with those made by traditional H-bonds.     

Dislocation structure of coarse-plate perlite in carbon steel after cold and high-temperature strain

It is demonstrated that during cold plastic deformation of coarse-plate perlite in carbon steel, planar cementite defects play the key role in deformation transfer through interphase boundaries and promote dissolution of cementite plates. It is first established that the austenite substructure formed upon high-temperature deformation is inherited by cementite and ferrite components of perlite during the subsequent phase transformation.Translated from Izvestiya Vysshikh Uchebnykh Zavedenii, Fizika, No. 8, pp. 18–27, August, 2004.     

Stoichiometric and catalytic reductive aldol cyclizations of alkynediones induced by Stryker's reagent

Conjugate reduction of alkynones by stoichiometric [(Ph(3)P)CuH](6) or catalytic [(Ph(3)P)CuH](6) and polymethyl-hydrosiloxane proceeds to cyclization by an aldol reaction with tethered ketones to generate [small beta]-hydroxyenones with good diastereoselectivity.     

Microbial desulfurization of different coals

Coal is the most important nonrenewable energy source of fossil origin. It is also the most common fuel in thermal power plants. However, during coal incineration in power plants, high sulfur content of coal poses serious environmental problems owing to sulfur dioxide emission. We studied the application of microbial methods for removal of sulfur from three types of high sulfur coals—two samples collected from Assam and Rajasthan in India and one from Libiaz, Poland. These coal samples were desulfurized using indigenous Acidithiobacillus sp. After investigation of the effect of various parameters, the conditions optimized for the maximum removal of total sulfur (91.87% for lignite, 63.13% for Polish coal, and only 9.44% for Assam coal) were as follows: initial pH of 1.5 (2.5 in the case of Assam coal), particle size of 45 μ, pulp density of 2% (w/v), incubation period of 30 d at −35°C in presence of 44.2 g/L of ferrous sulfate in the media with shaking at 140 rpm. Poor removal of sulfur in the case of Assam coal was owing to extensive precipitation of jarosites. In addition, the sulfur in Assam coal is mostly found in organic form, which is difficult to remove with Acidithiobacillus sp. The removal of sulfur from the three coal samples was demonstrated with photomicrographic studies.     

Material distribution across the interface of random and ordered island arrays

We grow single and twofold stacked island layers on patterned substrates and investigate the material distribution in and around the patterned area. For both layers a pronounced material depletion region occurs outside the pattern. The material gradients across the planar-patterned interface are symmetric in the first, but highly asymmetric in the second layer. We can describe these phenomena by simulations that take into account the surface curvature for the first and a strain-field modulated surface for the second layer.     

Plasma ion evolution in the wake of a high-intensity ultrashort laser pulse

Experimental investigations of the late-time ion structures formed in the wake of an ultrashort, intense laser pulse propagating in a tenuous plasma have been performed using the proton imaging technique. The pattern found in the wake of the laser pulse shows unexpectedly regular modulations inside a long, finite width channel. On the basis of extensive particle in cell simulations of the plasma evolution in the wake of the pulse, we interpret this pattern as due to ion modulations developed during a two-stream instability excited by the return electric current generated by the wakefield.     

Collapse-induced quantum nonlocal effect

In this article we attempt to bring out some significant general aspects of what we call collapse-induced quantum nonlocal effects resulting from the use of the hypothesis of wave function collapse.     

Electron mobility in compensated semiconductors at low temperatures

Electron mobility in compensated semiconductors for ionised impurity scattering is calculated. A simple screened dipole potential is used. The calculations differ from those of Stratton due to the fact that in this paper the mobility is exactly calculated.     

Generalization of convex and related functions

In this paper some new kinds of generalized Logarithmic and Harmonic Convex functions have been introduced and their relationships with known concepts have been discussed.