Synthesis and properties of pyridinocalixarenes

Several facets of pyridinocalixarene chemistry have been investigated including reaction pathways for their formation from the base-catalyzed alkylation of the parent calixarenes with PicCl·HCl, effect of the nature and identity of the base on regio- and stereoselectiveO-alkylations, creation of molecular asymmetry in calix[4]arenes and enantiomeric resolution, conformation and conformational mobility, and complexation.This paper is dedicated to the commemorative issue on the 50th anniversary of calixarenes.     

Electron impact induced ortho effects in 2-nitro-substituted aromatic sulphides containing 2-pyridyl, 2-(5-methylthio-1,3,4-thiadiazolyl) and/or 2-(4-methyl-1,3,4-thiadiazolinyl-5-thione) moieties

The most significant mass spectral features of 14 title compounds are discussed with the aid of deuterium labelling experiments. The decomposition patterns of these compounds are strongly affected by several competing ortho effects, due to the interaction of the nitro function(s) with neighbouring electron-poor N-heterocycles. Very intense polycyclic ions are produced via addition-elimination reactions by loss of simple radicals (H˙, OH˙, NO₂˙) from the molecular ion, followed by the ejection of neutral molecules (HNO₂,CH₃SCN or CH₃NCS). In addition, primary or secondary intramolecular oxygen transfers, preceded or not by hydrogen migration, from the nitro group to the imino carbon via spirocyclic intermediates, are generally observed. Minor skeletal rearrangements, triggered by single or multiple intramolecular oxygen transfer to the bridgehead sulphur atom, followed by SO or SO₂ ejection, are also noticed.     

Mechanism of action of quaternary diamino quenchers in capillary zone electrophoresis

The synthesis of two novel amino compounds, able to quench and reverse the electroosmotic low (EOF) in capillary electrophoresis is here reported. These chemicals are derivatives of two previously described quaternarized piperazines, 1-(4-iodobutyl)-1,4-dimethylpiperazin-1-ium iodide (M1C4I) and 1-(4-iodobutyl)4-aza-1-azoniabicyclo[2.2.2] octane iodide (M7C4I), believed to bind covalently to the silica surface via alkylation of ionized silanols through their terminal, reactive iodine. The novel compounds, although unable to form a covalent bond, due to lack of the o-butyl iodine, are found to be very efficient in suppressing protein interaction with the wall and reversing the EOF. On the basis of their behavior in solution, the minimal structural motifs for strong binding of amino compounds to the silica wall have been derived and are thought to be: (i) the presence of two quaternary nitrogens in the molecule; (ii) a correct distance between said charged nitrogens, represented by a butyl chain (C(4)); (iii) an hydrophobic "decoration" of the molecules, consisting on a high CH(2)/N ratio (in the present case 8:1).     

Effect of lipophylic salts on ise detection limit: application to calixarene-based highly efficient potassium-selective electrodes

A new interpretative model for interpolation of potentiometric data from liquid membrane ion selective electrodes has been formulated; the model allows one to achieve information about partitioning equilibria establishing at the membrane-analysed solution interface of hydrophilic cations present in the membrane as counterions of exchanger lipophylic anions. The fundamental importance of such equilibria is related to their contribution to the detection limit of the electrodes. The soundness of the proposed model was positively verified by employing it in the characterization of new K(+)-selective electrodes based on a calixarenic ionophore. Although the validity of interpolation based on our model does not significantly differ from that obtained with the simpler model providing the inclusion of a constant parameter in the logarithmic argument of Nicolski-Eisenman's equation, the information obtained resulted to be analytically suitable for optimising the membrane composition and, as a consequence, the performance of the electrodes.     

A new heptanuclear dendritic ruthenium(II) complex featuring photoinduced energy transfer across high-energy subunits.

The new heptanuclear ruthenium(II) dendron, [Cl(2)Ru{(micro-2,3dpp)Ru[(micro-2,3-dpp)Ru(bpy)2]2}2](PF6)12 (1; 2,3-dpp=2,3-bis(2'-pyridyl)pyrazine; bpy = 2,2'-bipyridine), was prepared by means of the "complexes as ligands/complexes as metals" synthetic strategy, and its absorption spectrum, redox behavior, and luminescence properties were investigated. Compound 1 is a multicomponent species, which contains three different types of chromophores (namely, the {Cl(2)Ru(micro-2,3-dpp)2} core, the {Ru(micro-2,3dpp)3}2+ intermediate, and the {(bpy)2Ru(micro-2,3-dpp)}2+ peripheral subunits) and several redox-active sites. The new species exhibits very intense absorption bands in the UV region (epsilon value in the 10(5)-10(6) M(-1) cm(-1) range) as a result of spin-allowed ligand-centered (LC) transitions, and intense bands in the visible region (epsilon value in the 10(4)-10(5) M(-1) cm(-1) range) as a result of the various spin-allowed metal-to-ligand charge-transfer (MLCT) transitions. The redox investigation (accomplished by cyclic and differential pulse voltammetry) indicates that 1 undergoes a series of reversible metal-centered oxidation and ligand-centered reduction processes within the potential window investigated (+1.90 / -1.40 V vs. the standard calomel electrode, SCE). The assignment of each absorption bond and redox process to specific subunits of 1 was achieved by comparison with the properties of smaller multinuclear species of the same family, namely [Cl(2)Ru{(micro-2,3-dpp)Ru(bpy)2}2]4+ (2), [(bpy)2Ru(u-2,3-dpp)Ru(bpy)2]4+ (4), and [Ru{(micro-2,3-dpp)Ru(bpy)2}3]4+ (5). The title compound exhibits luminescence both at room temperature in acetonitrile fluid solution and at 77 K in butyronitrile rigid matrix. The emission is attributed to the triplet MLCT (3MLCT) state involving the core {Cl(2)Ru(micro-2,3-dpp)2} subunit. Interestingly, the 3MLCT levels involving the peripheral {(bpy)2Ru(micro-2,3-dpp)}2+ subunits are deactivated by energy transfer to the emitting level, in spite of the presence of interposed high-energy (Ru(micro-2,3-dpp)3}2+ components, which, in other dendrimers, acted as "isolating" subunits toward energy-transfer processes. Ultrafast experiments on 1 and on the parent species 2 and 5 allowed us to rationalize this behavior and highlight that a sequential two-step electron-transfer process can be held responsible for the efficient overall energy transfer, which offers a way to overcome a limitation in antenna metal dendrimers.     

Use of a process colorimeter in industrial processing of tomatoes

A system to provide on-line colour monitoring of tomato products was investigated. The tristimulus colorimeter used can supply hundreds of recordings per second to a remote PC, which elaborates the data in real time and shows the trend of all colorimetric data with respect to any scale. By using the linear regression equation obtained by processing the experimental data it is also possible to predict values for measurements carried out in quality control laboratories during the concentration phase.     

Primary photoinduced processes in bimetallic dyads with extended aromatic bridges. tetraazatetrapyridopentacene complexes of ruthenium(II) and osmium(II)

The photophysics of the binuclear complexes [(phen)2M(tatpp)M(phen)2]4+, where M = Ru or Os, phen = 1,10-phenanthroline, and tatpp = 9,11,20,22-tetraazatetrapyrido[3,2-a:2'3'-c:3',2'-l:2',3']pentacene, has been studied in acetonitrile and dichloromethane by femtosecond and nanosecond time-resolved techniques. The results demonstrate that complexes of different metals have different types of lowest excited state: a tatpp ligand-centered (LC) triplet in the case of Ru(II); a metal-to-ligand charge-transfer (MLCT) triplet state in the case of Os(II). The excited-state kinetics is strongly solvent-dependent. In the Ru(II) system, the formation and decay of the LC state take place, respectively, in 25 ps and ca. 5 ns in CH3CN and in 0.5 ps and 1.3 micros in CH2Cl2. These solvent effects can be rationalized on the basis of a thermally activated decay of the LC state through the upper MLCT state. In the Os(II) system, the formation and decay of the MLCT state take place, respectively, in 3.8 and 60 ps in CH3CN and in 0.5 and 4 ps in CH2Cl2. These effects are consistent with the solvent sensitivity of the MLCT energy, in terms of driving force and energy-gap law arguments. The relevance of these results for the use of ladder-type aromatic bridges as potential molecular wires is discussed.     

Approximation methods for the finite moment problem

In this work we determine the normal solution of the finite moment problem in three different Hilbert space settings, both in the absence and in the presence of noisy data. In two cases the normal solution is a polynomial while in the third it is not. However, in each case the normal solution is spanned by orthogonal functions that are obtained by computationally efficient algorithms. A criterion of a posteriori validation, to select that normal solution which minimizes the uniform norm of the recovery error, is also given. The effectiveness of the method is illustrated with a number of test functions, for the most part already proposed in the literature.     

A Calibration‐Base Method for the Evaluation of the Detection Limit of an Electrochemical Biosensor

The method based on the confidence limits of a regression straight line is applied to the linear portion of the calibration curve of a biosensor in order to determine the limit of detection. A practical application gives a detection limit of an ethanol biosensor greater than that calculated by using the method of the signal‐to‐noise‐ratio, S/N=3, but the value is more reliable because it accounts for the variability in the response at analyte additions. A simple approximation of the method is also presented.