Re-Analysis of Abdominal Gland Volatilome Secretions of the African Weaver Ant,Oecophylla longinoda (Hymenoptera: Formicidae)

The African weaver ant, Oecophylla longinoda, is used as a biological control agent for the management of pests. The ant has several exocrine glands in the abdomen, including Dufour’s, poison, rectal, and sternal glands, which are associated with pheromone secretions for intra-specific communication. Previous studies have analyzed the gland secretions of Dufour’s and poison glands. The chemistry of the rectal and sternal glands is unknown. We re-analyzed the secretions from Dufour’s and poison glands plus the rectal and sternal glands to compare their chemistries and identify additional components. We used the solid-phase microextraction (SPME) technique to collect gland headspace volatiles and solvent extraction for the secretions. Coupled gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (GC-MS) analysis detected a total of 78 components, of which 62 were being reported for the first time. These additional components included 32 hydrocarbons, 12 carboxylic acids, 5 aldehydes, 3 alcohols, 2 ketones, 4 terpenes, 3 sterols, and 1 benzenoid. The chemistry of Dufour’s and poison glands showed a strong overlap and was distinct from that of the rectal and sternal glands. The different gland mixtures may contribute to the different physiological and behavioral functions in this ant species.     

Evaluation of two chelators for labelling a PNA monomer with the fac-[Tc(CO)3] moiety

A PNA monomer containing thymine as nucleobase (1) was synthesized, characterized and coupled to the pyrazolyl containing ligand 3,5-Me₂pz(CH₂)₂N((CH₂)₃COOH)(CH₂)₂NHBoc (2) and to a modified cysteine S-(carboxymethyl-pentafluorphenyl)-N-[(trifluor)carbonyl]-l-cysteine methyl ester (3) yielding the bifunctional chelators 6 and 7, respectively. Reactions of 6 and 7 with the Re(I) tricarbonyl starting material [Re(CO)₃(H₂O)₃]Br afforded the complexes fac-[Re(CO)₃(κ³-6)]⁺ (8) and fac-[Re(CO)₃(κ³-7)] (9), respectively. The identity of 8 and 9 has been established based on IR spectroscopy, elemental analysis, ESI-MS spectrometry and HPLC. The multinuclear NMR spectroscopy (¹H, ¹³C, g-COSY, g-HSQC) has also been very informative in the case of complex 8, showing the presence of rotamers in solution. For 9 the NMR spectrum was too complex due to the presence of rotamers and diastereoisomers. The radioactive congeners of complexes 8 and 9, fac-[^99mTc(CO)₃(κ³-6)]⁺ (8a) and fac-[^99mTc(CO)³(κ³-7)] (9a), have been prepared by reacting the precursor fac-[^99mTc(CO)₃(H₂O)₃]⁺ with the corresponding ligands being their identity established by comparing their HPLC chromatograms with the HPLC of the rhenium surrogates.     

Comparison of the activation time effects and the internal energy distributions for the CID,PQD and HCD excitation modes

Reproducibility among different types of excitation modes is a major bottleneck in the field of tandem mass spectrometry library development in metabolomics. In this study, we specifically evaluated the influence of collision voltage and activation time parameters on tandem mass spectrometry spectra for various excitation modes [collision‐induced dissociation (CID), pulsed Q dissociation (PQD) and higher‐energy collision dissociation (HCD)] of Orbitrap‐based instruments. For this purpose, internal energy deposition was probed using an approach based on Rice–Rampserger–Kassel–Marcus modeling with three thermometer compounds of different degree of freedom (69, 228 and 420) and a thermal model. This model treats consecutively the activation and decomposition steps, and the survival precursor ion populations are characterized by truncated Maxwell–Boltzmann internal energy distributions. This study demonstrates that the activation time has a significant impact on MS/MS spectra using the CID and PQD modes. The proposed model seems suitable to describe the multiple collision regime in the PQD and HCD modes. Linear relationships between mean internal energy and collision voltage are shown for the latter modes and the three thermometer molecules. These results suggest that a calibration based on the collision voltage should provide reproducible for PQD, HCD to be compared with CID in tandem in space instruments. However, an important signal loss is observed in PQD excitation mode whatever the mass of the studied compounds, which may affect not only parent ions but also fragment ions depending on the fragmentation parameters. A calibration approach for the CID mode based on the variation of activation time parameter is more appropriate than one based on collision voltage. In fact, the activation time parameter in CID induces a modification of the collisional regime and thus helps control the orientation of the fragmentation pathways (competitive or consecutive dissociations). Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Ab initio spectroscopic study for the NaRb molecule in ground and excited states

A wide adiabatic study is performed for NaRb molecule, involving 15¹Σ⁺ electronic states including the ionic state Na^?Rb⁺, as well as 14³Σ⁺, 1–9^1,3Π, and 1–5^1,3Δ states. This investigation is performed using an ab initio approach which involves the effective core potential, the core polarization potential with l‐dependent cut‐off functions. The NaRb system has been treated as a two‐electron system and the full valence configuration interaction is easily achieved. The spectroscopic constants R_e, D_e, T_e, ω_e, ω_ex_e, B_e, and D₀ for all these states are derived. We have also computed the vibrational levels as well their spacing for different values of J. In addition, permanent and transition dipole moments are determined and analyzed. The Dunham coefficients have been used to perform experimental spacing to compare directly with our results. The present calculations on NaRb extend previous theoretical works to numerous electronic excited states in the various symmetries. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

One-dimensional quantum description of the bending vibrations of HCN/CNH for high values of the total angular momentum

For high values of the quantum number of the total angular momentum J (up to J = 20), quantum mechanical eigenstates (eigenvalues and eigenfunctions) are calculated by the method of Gatti et al. (J. Mol. Spectrosc. 181 (1997) 403) for the bending deformations of HCN and CNH. In particular, we have examined the l-type resonances in highly excited rovibrational states within the framework of a one-dimensional model, i.e. along the reaction pathway for the isomerization reaction HCN/CNH. The potential energy surface used is that of Bowman et al. (J. Chem. Phys. 99 (1993) 308).     

Electron-pairing analysis from localization and delocalization indices in the framework of the atoms-in-molecules theory

This article presents an overview of recent advances in the study of electron pairing through the use of localization and delocalization indices obtained from double integration over atomic basins of the exchange–correlation density in the framework of the atoms-in-molecules theory. These localization and delocalization indices describe the intra- and interatomic distribution of the electron pairs in a molecule. The main results of the application of these second-order indices to the analysis of molecular structure and chemical reactivity are briefly reviewed. It is shown that localization and delocalization indices represent a powerful tool to describe the electron-pair structure of molecules, which, in turn, provides deeper insight into relevant chemical phenomena such as electron correlation effects and the formation of localized α, β electron pairs. Received: 8 April 2002 / Accepted: 26 June 2002 / Published online: 6 September 2002 Acknowledgements. Financial help was furnished by the Spanish DGES projects no. PB98-0457-C02-01 and BQU2002-04112-C02-02. J.P. thanks the Departament d'Universitats, Recerca i Societat de la Informació de la Generalitat de Catalunya for benefiting from a doctoral fellowship, no. 2000FI-00582. M.S. is indebted to the Departament d'Universitats, Recerca i Societat de la Informació of the Generalitat de Catalunya for financial support through the Distinguished University Research Promotion, 2001. We also thank the Centre de Supercomputació de Catalunya for providing us with computing facilities. Correspondence to: M. Solà e-mail: miquel.sola@udg.es     

Model-independent constraints on spin observables

We discuss model-independent constraints on spin observables in exclusive and inclusive reactions, with special attention to the case of photoproduction.