Peptidehelicenes in solution and gel: chiral discrimination through interactions between two types of helixes

Helical [5]thiaheterohelicene 5HM, which rapidly interconverts between P and M enantiomers in solution, was connected to helical l-phenylalanine oligomers with an ester linkage to give peptidehelicenes (5Fn, where n: number of bonded phenylalanines). The characteristics of 5F4 and 5F5 with two types of helixes in a molecule were investigated, particularly in comparison with those of 5F1–5F3 with an incomplete coil of a peptide moiety. l-Phenylalanine peptide chains induced a shift in the equilibrium between the P and M helixes of 5HM toward the P side for all the 5Fns examined. The enantiomeric excess (ee) of the P form increased with a decrease in temperature, together with an elongation of the peptide chains. 5F4 and 5F5 in hot solutions of some solvents formed a gel at room temperature, whereas 5F1–5F3 showed no such behavior. In this gel, the stable helical form of the 5HM moiety in 5F4 and 5F5 was observed to be the M form in contrast to that in their solutions.     

Low Power Penalty Operation of a Wide Input Dynamic Range Cross-Phase Modulation Wavelength Converter

We successfully demonstrated low power penalty operation of a cross-phase modulated (XPM) wavelength converter using a semiconductor optical amplifier (SOA) power equalizer. We also clarified the SOA equalizing level for more adaptive wavelength conversion and achieved a power penalty of less than 1 dB over the wide input dynamic range of 15 dB.     

A Regularly Preemptive Model and its Approximations

A regularly preemptive model D,MAP/D ₁,D ₂/1 is studied. Priority customers have constant inter-arrival times and constant service times. On the other hand, ordinary customers' arrivals follow a Markovian Arrival Process (MAP) with constant service times. Although this model can be formulated by using the piecewise Markov process, there remain some difficult problems on numerical calculations. In order to solve these problems, a novel approximation model MAP/MR/1 with Markov renewal services is proposed. These two queueing processes become different due to the existence of idle periods. Thus, a MAP/MR/1 queue with a general boundary condition is introduced. It is a model with the exceptional first service in each busy period. In particular, two special models are studied: one is a warm-up queue and the other is a cool-down queue. It can be proved that the waiting time of ordinary customers for the regular preemption model is stochastically smaller than the waiting time of the former model. On the other hand, it is stochastically larger than the waiting time of the latter model.     

Multi-period resource allocation for estimating project costs in competitive bidding

Central European Journal of Operations Research - In competitive bidding for project contracts, contractors estimate the cost of completing a project and then determine the bid price. Accordingly,...     

Phase structure change and ER effect in liquid crystalline polymer/dimethylsiloxane blends

The mechanism of the electrorheological (ER) effect in two types of liquid crystalline polymer (LCP)/dimethylsiloxane (DMS) blends was investigated by rheological measurements and by structure observation under electric field and shear flow. The results show that the phase structures of these immiscible blends can be categorized into slipping (low viscosity) and non-slipping (high viscosity) states. In the non-slipping state, higher viscosity LCP domains connect the electrodes. In the slipping state, on the other hand, LCP domains do not connect the electrodes and the shear is mainly confined in the lower viscosity DMS domains. The ER effect (electrically induced viscosity increase) originates from the electrically induced slipping to non-slipping transition. In one of the blends, the ER effect occurs only at high shear rate, since this blend is in non-slipping state even under no field if the shear rate is low. Received: 29 April 1997 Accepted: 3 November 1997     

Hydrosilanes are not always a reducing reagent: a ruthenium-catalyzed introduction of primary alkyl groups to electron-rich aromatic rings using esters as a source of the alkyl groups

A triruthenium cluster, (μ₃, η², η³, η⁵-acenaphthylene)Ru₃(CO)₇ effectively catalyzes primary-alkylation reaction of electron-rich aromatic rings using a combination of hydrosilane and ester as a source of the primary-alkyl group. The reaction involves electrophilic substitution of arenes by carbocationic species stabilized by a neighboring alkoxy or siloxy group generated during the reduction of esters giving alkylated arenes after reductive removal of the alkoxy or siloxy group at the benzylic position.