Electrostatic free energy of weakly charged macromolecules in solution and intermacromolecular complexes consisting of oppositely charged polymers

When oppositely charged polyelectrolytes are mixed in water, attraction between oppositely charged groups may lead to the formation of polyelectrolyte complexes (associative phase separation, complex coacervation, interpolymer complexes). Theory is presented to describe the electrostatic free energy change when ionizable (annealed) (macro-)molecules form a macroscopic polyelectrolyte complex. The electrostatic free energy includes an electric term as well as a chemical term that is related to the dissociation of the ionic groups in the polymer. An example calculation for complexation of polyacid with polybase uses a cylindrical diffuse double layer model for free polymer in solution and electroneutrality within the complex and calculates the free energy of the system when the polymer is in solution or in a polyelectrolyte complex. Combined with a term for the nonelectrostatic free energy change upon complexation, a theoretical stability diagram is constructed that relates pH, salt concentration, and mixing ratio, which is in qualitative agreement with an experimental diagram obtained by Bungenberg de Jong (1949) for complex coacervation of arabic gum and gelatin. The theory furthermore explains the increased tendency toward phase separation when the polymer becomes more strongly charged and suggests that complexation of polyacid or polybase with zwitterionic polymer (e.g., protein) of the same charge sign (at the "wrong side" of the iso-electric point) may be due (in part) to an induced charge reversal of the protein.     

Synthesis and anticholinesterase activity of some new fluorogenic analogues of organophosphorus nerve agents

Eighteen new fluorogenic analogues of organophosphorus nerve agents were synthesised and characterised. They included analogues of tabun, sarin, cyclosarin, soman, VX, and Russian VX, with the 7-oxy-4-methylcoumarin or 7-oxy-4-(trifluoromethyl)coumarin leaving group. These analogues inhibited acetylcholinesterase (AChE) effectively in vitro and therefore have potential as tools for the identification of novel organophosphatases in biological systems. Analogues of VX and Russian VX with the 7-amino-4-methylcoumarin group, although poor AChE inhibitors, may have utility for screening enzyme libraries for phosphoramidases capable of cleaving P-N bonds.     

Electrokinetic effects of adsorbed neutral polymers

On the basis of a previously developed hydrodynamic model for adsorbed polymers the charge flow along a charged interface with adsorbed (uncharged) polymer is calculated. An effective electrokinetic layer thickness is defined and its dependence on the characteristics of the adsorbed polymer and the ionic strength is studied. It is found that tails are very important for the hydrodynamic effects considered because they effectively screen the solvent flow from inner parts of the absorbed layer. The electrokinetic layer thickness increases with decreasing ionic strength, and tends to a limit equal to the hydrodynamic thickness at very low ionic strength.     

Capillary electrophoresis with wavelength-resolved laser-induced fluorescence detection

Capillary electrophoresis (CE) enables rapid separations with high separation efficiency and compatibility with small sample volumes. Laser-induced fluorescence detection can result in extremely low limits of detection in CE. Single-channel fluorescence detection, however, furnishes little qualitative information about a species being detected, except for its CE migration time. Use of multidimensional information often enables unambiguous identification of analytes. Combination of CE with information-rich wavelength-resolved fluorescence detection is analogous with ultraviolet-visible diode-array detection and furnishes both qualitative and quantitative chemical information about target species. This review discusses recent advances in wavelength-resolved laser-induced fluorescence detection coupled with CE, with an emphasis on instrument design.     

On the mechanism of negative differential resistance in ferrocenylundecanethiol self-assembled monolayers

Negative differential resistance (NDR) peaks in the current-voltage characteristics of ferrocenylundecanethiol self-assembled monolayers are not reversible. The peaks turn to smoothly increasing currents as oxygen is removed from the system, indicating that NDR arises from the reaction of an energetic charged species with ambient oxygen.     

Magnetic circular dichroism studies XXXII

CNDO calculations of the MCD spectra of 7- and 9-methyladenine have been carried out in two approximations. A minor modification of the CNDO/S method of Jaffé and coworkers shows an improvement over Jaffé's parameterization with respect to band separations and the signs of the MCDB terms, but is not applicable ton→ π* transitions.     

Phosphorescence of thermally oxidised poly(butadiene) and model enones: temperature dependence

The temperature dependence of phosphorescence of model enone compounds in poly (methyl methacrylate) matrix and glassy methylcyclohexane/isopentane solution and of enones formed from thermal oxidation of poly (butadiene) has been studied over the temperature range 77–220°K. The single discontinuity in the plot for the model enone-glassy solvent is due to the freezing of a (solvent perturbed) barrier to rotation in the enone, and an analogous transition is also observed in the model enone poly (methyl methacrylate) samples and in thermally oxidised poly (butadiene). In the polymer matrices, a second transition corresponding to the γ-transition in poly (methyl methacrylate) and the glass transition temperature T_g in poly (butadiene) are also revealed in the Arrhenius plots. The results demonstrate that care must be taken in ascribing such discontinuities solely to polymer properties since intrinsic properties of the luminescence probe itself may exhibit similar features.     

Bis(cyclopentadienyl)titanium complexes of naphthalene-1,8-dithiolates, biphenyl 2,2'-dithiolates, and related ligands

Titanocene 1,8-dithiolato-naphthalene and titanocene 2,2'-dithiolato biphenyl are produced by the reaction of naphtho[1,8-cd]-1,2-dithiole [or the biphenyl] with titanocene dicarbonyl (Ti(II)) in toluene at room temperature. The pro-ligands 2,7-di(tert-butyl)naphtho[1,8-cd]-1,2-dithiole, 5,6-dihydroacenaphtho[5,6-cd]-1,2-dithiole, 4,5-dithioacephenanthrylene, and 13,14-dithiapicene have been used in similar reactions with titanocene dicarbonyl to investigate the effect of steric bulk and of varying the naphthalene backbone on the final complex. The resulting Cp(2)TiS(2)Ar complexes (Ar = naphthalene) have been shown by temperature-dependent (1)H NMR spectroscopy to exist in solution in an envelope conformation with the six-membered TiS(2)C(3) rings undergoing inversion on the NMR time scale while the similar Cp(2)TiS(2)Ar complexes (Ar = biphenyl, binaphthalene) interconvert more rapidly. Titanocene 2,2'-disulfinato biphenyl has been synthesized by the salt elimination reaction of titanocene dichloride (Ti(IV)) and the disodium salt of biphenyl 2,2'-disulfinic acid. Finally, the effect of using pro-ligands where the sulfur atoms have been mono- or di-oxidized has been studied, and an interesting oxygen elimination reaction is observed for the S=O fragments but not for the SO(2) groups. All complexes have been characterized spectroscopically and seven X-ray structures are reported.     

Steric mode of enzymic hydroxylation at primary carbon atoms: Hydroxylation of (1R)- and (1S)-[1-3H, 2H, 1H][1-14C]-octanes by Pseudomonas Oleovorans

(1R)- and (1S) [1-³H, ²H, ¹H]-octanes and mixed with [1-¹⁴C]-octane, were synthesized. The mixed samples were incubated with homogenats of P. oleovorans strain TF4-1L and the biosynthesized mixtures of octanols isolated. It was shown that mainly the achiral termini [-C¹H₃] were hydroxylated and that chiral methyls were oxygenated to the extent of 20–30%. In all instances the products derived from hydroxylation at the chiral methyls [-C-³H, ²H, ¹H] were mixtures of (1R)- and (1S)-octanols, the major component of which was the alcohol obtained by displacement of ¹H. The results indicate that hydroxylation proceeded with a normal isotope effect k_h>k_d>k_t. The amount of (1R)-octanol in the mixtures of octanols derived from (1R)- and (1S)-octane was determined. It was found that the C-1 hydroxylation of octane proceeded with retention, i.e. the incoming hydroxyl assumed the orientation of the displaced hydrogen (or isotopic hydrogen) atom.     

Unbiased expectation values from diffusion quantum Monte Carlo simulations with a fixed number of walkers

We append forward walking to a diffusion Monte Carlo algorithm which maintains a fixed number of walkers. This removes the importance sampling bias of expectation values of operators which do not commute with the Hamiltonian. We demonstrate the effectiveness of this approach by employing three importance sampling functions for the hydrogen atom ground state, two very crude. We estimate moments of the electron-nuclear distance, static polarizabilities, and high-order hyperpolarizabilites up to the fourth power in the electric field, where no use is made of the finite field approximation. The results agree with the analytical values, with a statistical error which increases substantially with decreasing overlap of the guiding function with the exact wave function.