Kinetics of chalcone oxidation by peroxide anion catalysed by poly-l-leucine

An insight into the kinetics, mechanism and optimum reaction conditions of the Julia-Colonna epoxidation has been gained using a soluble polyleucine catalyst.     

Study of the oligopeptide fraction in Grana Padano and Parmigiano-Reggiano cheeses by liquid chromatography electrospray ionization mass spectrometry

The oligopeptide fractions of Grana Padano and Parmigiano Reggiano cheese samples, at various stages of ageing (6, 12, 18 and 24 months), were analysed by means of high-performance liquid chromatography coupled to electrospray ionisation mass spectrometry (ESI-MS). The main oligopeptides (< 5000 Da) present in the samples were extracted by using an originally developed method which allowed good enrichment of the oligopeptide fractions and identified according to their molecular weights. The casein sequences compatible with the found molecular weights were determined and the exact oligopeptide sequences were identified by using the fragmentation peaks originated by in-source collisionally-induced dissociation (CID). The ESI-MS method reported here allowed the sequence identification of oligopeptides very quickly with a single liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry run. Oligopeptides were also semi-quantified by comparison with a suitable internal standard (the dipeptide phenylalanyl-phenylalanine, Phe-Phe). This methodology demonstrated that, as far as the main oligopeptides are concerned, Grana Padano and Parmigiano Reggiano presented very similar composition. Anyway, the evolution of the fractions during ageing time was characteristically distinct among the two cheeses: in Grana Padano cheeses most of the oligopeptides reached a maximum at 12 months of ageing and then decreased, whereas in Parmigiano Reggiano cheeses the oligopeptide amounts were usually lower and had a less regular trend. The reason for this different behaviour may be ascribed to the different production techniques.     

The simple geometry of perfect information games

Perfect information games have a particularly simple structure of equilibria in the associated normal form. For generic such games each of the finitely many connected components of Nash equilibria is contractible. For every perfect information game there is a unique connected and contractible component of subgame perfect equilibria. Finally, the graph of the subgame perfect equilibrium correspondence, after a very mild deformation, looks like the space of perfect information extensive form games.     

An approach to infinitary temporal proof theory

Aim of this work is to investigate from a proof-theoretic viewpoint a propositional and a predicate sequent calculus with an –type schema of inference that naturally interpret the propositional and the predicate until–free fragments of Linear Time Logic LTL respectively. The two calculi are based on a natural extension of ordinary sequents and of standard modal rules. We examine the pure propositional case (no extralogical axioms), the propositional and the first order predicate cases (both with a possibly infinite set of extralogical axioms). For each system we provide a syntactic proof of cut elimination and a proof of completeness.Supported by MIUR COFIN 02 Teoria dei Modelli e Teoria degli Insiemi, loro interazioni ed applicazioni.Supported by MIUR COFIN 02 PROTOCOLLO.Mathematics Subject Classification (2000):03B22, 03B45, 03F05     

Equilibrium cluster phases and low-density arrested disordered states: the role of short-range attraction and long-range repulsion

We study a model in which particles interact with short-ranged attractive and long-ranged repulsive interactions, in an attempt to model the equilibrium cluster phase recently discovered in sterically stabilized colloidal systems in the presence of depletion interactions. At low packing fractions, particles form stable equilibrium clusters which act as building blocks of a cluster fluid. We study the possibility that cluster fluids generate a low-density disordered arrested phase, a gel, via a glass transition driven by the repulsive interaction. In this model the gel formation is formally described with the same physics of the glass formation.     

Faster-than-c Signals, Special Relativity, and Causality

Motivated by the recent attention on superluminal phenomena, we investigate the compatibility between faster-than-c propagation and the fundamental principles of relativity and causality. We first argue that special relativity can easily accommodate—indeed, does not exclude—faster-than-c signaling at the kinematical level. As far as causality is concerned, it is impossible to make statements of general validity, without specifying at least some features of the tachyonic propagation. We thus focus on the Scharnhorst effect (faster-than-c photon propagation in the Casimir vacuum), which is perhaps the most plausible candidate for a physically sound realization of these phenomena. We demonstrate that in this case the faster-than-c aspects are “benign” and constrained in such a manner as to not automatically lead to causality violations.     

Solitonic all-optical switch based on the fractional Talbot effect

A periodic pattern of hundreds of beams is shifted by half its transverse period as the result of excitation of parametric spatial solitons and the fractional Talbot effect. The all-optical switch that is obtained operates with 1-ps pulses.     

Potential energy landscape equation of state

Depth, number, and shape of the basins of the potential energy landscape are the key ingredients of the inherent structure thermodynamic formalism introduced by Stillinger and Weber [F. H. Stillinger and T. A. Weber, Phys. Rev. A 25, 978 (1982)]. Within this formalism, an equation of state based only on the volume dependence of these landscape properties is derived. Vibrational and configurational contributions to pressure are sorted out in a transparent way. Predictions are successfully compared with data from extensive molecular dynamics simulations of a simple model for the fragile liquid orthoterphenyl.     

Nonconservative earthquake model of self-organized criticality on a random graph

We numerically investigate the Olami-Feder-Christensen model on a quenched random graph. Contrary to the case of annealed random neighbors, we find that the quenched model exhibits self-organized criticality deep within the nonconservative regime. The probability distribution for avalanche size obeys finite size scaling, with universal critical exponents. In addition, a power law relation between the size and the duration of an avalanche exists. We propose that this may represent the correct mean-field limit of the model rather than the annealed random neighbor version.     

Truncation of power law behavior in "scale-free" network models due to information filtering

We formulate a general model for the growth of scale-free networks under filtering information conditions-that is, when the nodes can process information about only a subset of the existing nodes in the network. We find that the distribution of the number of incoming links to a node follows a universal scaling form, i.e., that it decays as a power law with an exponential truncation controlled not only by the system size but also by a feature not previously considered, the subset of the network "accessible" to the node. We test our model with empirical data for the World Wide Web and find agreement.