Mixed vesicle formation on a ternary surfactant system: didodecyldimethylammonium bromide/dodecylethyldimethylammonium bromide/water

The formation of mixed aggregates has been investigated on a ternary system consisting of two cationic surfactants with similar polar heads and two and/or one 12 carbon atom hydrophobic tail, respectively, didodecyldimethylammonium bromide and dodecylethyldimethylammonium bromide and water. The study has been carried out by means of conductivity, zeta potential, and cryogenic transmission electronic microscopy (cryo-TEM) experiments on the very diluted region. A variety of mixed aggregates, microaggregates, vesicles, and micelles has been found, depending on system composition and total surfactant concentration. Mixed critical microaggregate concentration and mixed critical vesicle concentration have been determined from conductivity data. Furthermore, zeta potential and cryo-TEM experiments allow for the characterization of the aggregates/solution interface and of the shape and size of the aggregates. This experimental evidence has also been analyzed in terms of the theoretical packing parameter, P.     

The Colle–Salvetti Wavefunction Revisited: a Comparison Between Three Approaches for Obtaining the Correlation Energy

The correlation factor of Colle and Salvetti is studied by comparing the behavior of three different correlation functionals. The normalization, sum rule, Coulomb hole, correlation energy integrand, and the Wigner exclusion hole have all been analyzed by applying the three approaches. The results indicate that the correlation factor proposed by Colle–Salvetti is a very good choice for modeling electron correlation in atoms. The flaws appearing in the development of the Colle–Salvetti equations seem mainly due to an inadequate use of the first mean value theorem of integral calculus. The Gaussian summation used for the two-body density matrix seems to be a good approximation to obtain the correlation factor equations.     

Resveratrol content of some wines obtained from dried Valpolicella grapes: Recioto and Amarone

Resveratrol (rans-3,5,4'-trihydroxystilbene), a phenolic substance present in both grape skin and wines, is a phytoalexin involved in grey mould resistance. A new interest has surfaced in recent years related to the antioxidative actions of resveratrol, which in vivo could be related to the prevention of cardiovascular diseases linked to lipid metabolism, particularly HDL production, while the antifungal activity may be of interest in wine production technology. These aspects have led to the publication of a number of papers reporting data on the resveratrol content of several kind of wine: for Italian wines, it ranges between 0.5 and 10 ppm, depending on cultivar, area of cultivation, climate and wine-making technology. In this work, resveratrol was quantified in samples of two unusual Italian wines, Recioto (sweet) and Amarone (dry), produced with the same cultivar mixture in the same area (Valpolicella, Verona, Italy) and with the same grape conditioning technique. After resveratrol extraction, reversed-phase HPLC analysis was carried out and several elution conditions were tested. The resveratrol content of Recioto and Amarone wines was lower than the values reported in the literature for other wines, ranging between 0.05 and 0.8 ppm.     

Observation of azo chromophore fluorescence and phosphorescence emissions from DBH by applying exclusively the orbital confinement effect in siliceous zeolites devoid of charge-balancing cations

The molecular orbital (MO) confinement theory predicts that the HOMO and LUMO of an organic guest may become distorted when the dimensions of the host cavity approach closely those of the MO (Corma, A.; García, H.; Sastre, G.; Viruela, P. M. J. Phys. Chem. B 1997, 101, 4575-4582). Generally, quantum chemical calculations assume that the MO extends over all the space. However, the fact that a molecule is confined within a restricted cavity might impose certain limits to its MO. In agreement with this theory, we have observed for the first time the phosphorescence emission from 2,3-diazabicyclo[2.2.1]hept-2-ene (DBH) upon incorporation in zeolites devoid of charge-balancing cations, even at room temperature. This observation may be rationalized on the basis of two possible effects: (i) Decrease of the HOMO-LUMO gap induced by confinement of the azo np* chromophore favors ISC, and (ii) inhibition of radiationless deactivation pathway by the immobilization of DBH within the zeolite host favors long lifetimes.     

Radiation-grafting of 2-bromoethylacrylate onto polyethylene film by preirradiation method

Radiation-induced graft polymerization of bromoethylacrylate onto a low-density polyethylene (LDPE) film by preirradiaiton method in the presence of air has been investigated. The appropriate reaction conditions for the graft polymerization were determined. It was observed that the grafting is governed by several factors, such as preirradation dose and grafting temperature. The degree of grafting increased rapidly with the initial reaction time and then leveled off to the final value. The optimum temperature for grafting was determined to be 55°C.     

New approach based on fuzzy logic and principal component analysis for the classification of two-dimensional maps in health and disease. Application to lymphomas

Two-dimensional (2D) electrophoresis is the most wide spread technique for the separation of proteins in biological systems. This technique produces 2D maps of high complexity, which creates difficulties in the comparison of different samples. The method proposed in this paper for the comparison of different 2D maps can be summarised in four steps: (a) digitalisation of the image; (b) fuzzyfication of the digitalised map in order to consider the variability of the two-dimensional electrophoretic separation; (c) decoding by principal component analysis of the previously obtained fuzzy maps, in order to reduce the system dimensionality; (d) classification analysis (linear discriminant analysis), in order to separate the samples contained in the dataset according to the classes present in said dataset. This method was applied to a dataset constituted by eight samples: four belonging to healthy human lymph-nodes and four deriving from non-Hodgkin lymphomas. The amount of fuzzyfication of the original map is governed by the sigma parameter. The larger the value, the more fuzzy theresulting transformed map. The effect of the fuzzyfication parameter was investigated, the optimal results being obtained for sigma = 1.75 and 2.25. Principal component analysis and linear discriminant analysis allowed the separation of the two classes of samples without any misclassification.     

Reactivity of lactones and GHB formation

The behavior of lactones in their hydrolysis reactions is a good indicator of their reactivity as electrophilic molecules. The hydrolysis of four- to six-membered lactones was investigated in neutral (water) and slightly acid media and in water/dioxane media. The following conclusions were drawn: (i) The reactivity of beta-propiolactone in neutral water is more than four times greater than that of beta-butyrolactone, due to the flow of charge caused by the latter's methyl substituent. Reactivity is enthalpy-controlled. (ii) The reactivity of beta-lactones diminishes in water/dioxane media when the percentage of dioxane increases. The increase in the dioxane percentage relaxing the intermolecular hydrogen bonds in the ordered structure of the water reduces DeltaH# and simultaneously increases the -DeltaS# value. (iii) An inverse solvent kinetic isotope effect in the acid-catalyzed hydrolysis of gamma-butyrolactone and delta-valerolactone was observed, this being indicative of acyl cleavage. (iv) The DeltaH# and DeltaS# values permit discrimination between alkyl and acyl cleavage. (v) A correlation was found between the chemical reactivity of lactones and their carcinogenic activity. (vi) The results suggest that orally ingested gamma-butyrolactone remains largely in its nonhydrolyzed form in the stomach before passing into the blood. (vii) The concentration equilibrium constant of GHB formation at human body temperature is Keq (37 degrees C)=0.40. (viii) Study of GHB formation shows that, contrary to earlier results, this is an endothermic process, with DeltarH=3.6 kJ mol(-1).     

Monitoring of an industrial process by multivariate control charts based on principal component analysis

The control and monitoring of an industrial process is performed in this paper by the multivariate control charts. The process analysed consists of the bottling of the entire production of 1999 of the sparkling wine "Asti Spumante". This process is characterised by a great number of variables that can be treated with multivariate techniques. The monitoring of the process performed with classical Shewhart charts is very dangerous because they do not take into account the presence of functional relationships between the variables. The industrial process was firstly analysed by multivariate control charts based on Principal Component Analysis. This approach allowed the identification of problems in the process and of their causes. Successively, the SMART Charts (Simultaneous Scores Monitoring And Residual Tracking) were built in order to study the process in its whole. In spite of the successful identification of the presence of problems in the monitored process, the Smart chart did not allow an easy identification of the special causes of variation which casued the problems themselves.     

Homogenization of noncoercive functionals: Periodic materials with soft inclusions

In this paper we study the asymptotic behavior, ash→∞, of the minimum points of the functionals $$\int {[f(hx,Du) + gu]dx} $$ , wheref(x, ξ) is periodic inx and convex inξ, andu is vector valued. A convergence theorem is stated without uniform coerciveness assumptions.