Rhamnosylation of lignans by a Streptomyces strain

Screening of 400 Streptomyces strains for biotransformation of the natural lignan matairesinol led to the identification of Streptomyces sp. LS136, capable of producing a single metabolite in moderate yields. Isolation and purification by preparative HPLC, followed by structural analyses by LC-MS and NMR, established the structure as matairesinol-4-O-rhamnoside. This bacterial strain was also used for rhamnosylation of the abundant natural lignans, hydroxymatairesinol and secoisolariciresinol.     

On the distribution of the number of customers in the symmetric M/G/1 queue

We consider an M/G/1 queue with symmetric service discipline. The class of symmetric service disciplines contains, in particular, the preemptive last-come-first-served discipline and the processor-sharing discipline. It has been conjectured in Kella et al. [1] that the marginal distribution of the queue length at any time is identical for all symmetric disciplines if the queue starts empty. In this paper we show that this conjecture is true if service requirements have an Erlang distribution. We also show by a counterexample, involving the hyperexponential distribution, that the conjecture is generally not true. AMS Subject Classifications Primary—60K25; Secondary—90B22     

Regioselectivity in the ene-reaction of singlet oxygen with cyclic alkenes: photooxygenation of methyl-substituted 1,4-cyclohexadiene derivatives

The photooxygenation of the 1-methyl-, 2,3-dimethyl-, and 1,4-dimethylcyclohexa-1,4-dienes, which are readily available through Birch reduction, yielded the corresponding ene-products. The formed endocyclic dienes were trapped by the addition of singlet oxygen to give the corresponding bicyclic endoperoxy hydroperoxides. In the case of 1-methylcyclohexa-1,4-diene and 1,4-dimethylcyclohexa-1,4,-diene, the cis-effect determined the product distribution. Photooxygenation of 2,3-dimethylcyclohexa-1,4-dienes gave mainly exocyclic olefin, which was attributed to the lowered rotational barrier of the methyl group and increased reactivity of the methyl groups.     

Structural studies of Cr-doped mullite derived from single-phase precursors

Cr-doped mullites were prepared from single-phase precursors containing up to 9.60 wt% Cr₂O₃ using a sol-gel technique followed by thermal treatment. Particle induced X-ray emission spectroscopy and X-ray powder diffraction were used to characterize the samples. Mullites were orthorhombic, space group Pbam. Cr doping caused the increase of unit-cell parameters. Strongest expansion was noticed along c-axis followed by a and b (Δc/c=0.089, Δa/a=0.061, Δb/b=0.045% per mole Cr₂O₃). A second phase, namely θ-(Al,Cr)₂O₃, was revealed by XRD in the sample containing 9.60 wt% Cr₂O₃. The structure of mullites was refined by the Rietveld method, location of Cr³⁺ was performed by the EPR spectroscopy. At low chromium doping level (Cr₂O₃ content less than ∼5 wt%) Cr³⁺ ions were substituted for Al³⁺ in the AlO₆ octahedra of the mullite structure (M1 site). For higher doping level, Cr³⁺ ions were additionally substituted for Al³⁺ in the AlO₆ octahedra of the second phase [θ-(Al,Cr)₂O₃ at 1400 °C, or α-(Al,Cr)₂O₃ at 1600 °C] which segregated in the system. Substitution of Cr³⁺ for Al³⁺ on M1 site in the mullite structure resulted in increase of average distances in (M1)O₆ octahedron and decrease of average distances in T*O₄ tetrahedron, while average distances in TO₄ tetrahedron stayed almost constant.     

Conversion of single-stranded oligonucleotides into cloned duplexes and its consecutive application to short artificial genes.

A general method to convert single-stranded, chemically synthesized oligonucleotides into cloned duplexes is described. Oligonucleotides supplied with 3'-terminal extensions that are complementary to 3'-protruding ends obtained by certain restriction enzymes can be cloned either directly or with the help of an adapter molecule into double-stranded vectors. Two methods have also been developed for consecutive cloning applications. According to these methods, the synthetic oligonucleotides (and their enzymatically prepared complementary strands) are joined, one after the other, inside a cloning vector, each joining requiring one cloning step. Synthetic genes are thus built up from oligonucleotides corresponding to only one strand of the DNA. The sequential assembly of the cloned duplex takes place in the 5' to 3' direction. Each oligonucleotide is supplied with a four-nucleotide-long 3'-terminal extension, but this sequence is eliminated when the joining takes place, leaving no limiting sequence between the oligonucleotides. The two consecutive cloning methods, the adapter and the polycloning site methods, are illustrated by the assembly of short artificial genes.     

Neocompact Sets and the Fixed Point Property

We use a newly introduced concept of neocompactness to study problems from metric fixed point theory. In particular, we give a sufficient condition for a superreflexive Banach space X to have the fixed point property and obtain shorter proofs of some well-known results in that theory.     

Determination of iphosphamide and seven metabolites in blood plasma,as stable trifluoroacetyl derivatives,by electron capture chemical ionization GC-MS

A method is described for the determination of the antitumor agent iphosphamide and seven of its metabolites in the plasma of cancer patients by multiple ion monitoring (MIM) GC-MS, mainly using the electron capture chemical ionization mode, of stable methyl and/or trifluoroacetyl derivatives. The metabolites determined were 2- and 3-dechloroethyliphosphamide, 4-ketoiphosphamide, carboxyiphosphamide, iphosphamide mustard, and two previously undetected metabolites, chloroethylamine and 1,3-oxazolidine-2-one. The isolation of the acidic and neutral metabolites was performed by solid phase extraction on to C₁₈ adsorbent at pH 4. The weakly acidic iphosphamide mustard, isolated under these conditions with a yield of ca 50%, was measured as a stable methyltrifluoroacetyl derivative, in contrast to the corresponding phosphoramide mustard of the isomer cyclophosphamide which decomposes during derivatization. Chloroethylamine and 1,3-oxazolidine-2-one were isolated with high yield by liquid extraction with ethyl acetate at pH 10. Selective measurement of several metabolite derivatives with similar retention times was performed by multiple ion monitoring MS of specific ion masses, using a methyl phenyl siloxane capillary column previously employed in the study of cyclophosphamide metabolites. Quantitation of metabolites in patient plasma samples could be performed in the concentration range 3 ng to 20 μg per ml of original plasma.