Oxidation and determination of Gabapentin on nanotubes of nickel oxide-modified carbon paste electrode

The electrooxidation of Gabapentin was studied on nanotubes of nickel oxide-modified carbon paste electrode for the first time. Cyclic voltammetry was employed to investigate the electrooxidation process. A simple, sensitive, and efficient amperometric method was developed for the analysis of the drug, and the corresponding analytical parameters were reported. For Gabapentin, a detection limit of 0.3 μM was obtained in a linear range of 2.4–50 μM. The proposed amperometric method was also applied to the analysis of commercial capsules, and the results were in good agreement with the declared values. Also, the applicability of the method to the direct assay of the drug in human serum and urine was described.     

Rotating Bose-Einstein condensate in an optical lattice: Formulation of vortex configuration for the ground state

We consider a rotating Bose-Einstein condensate in an optical lattice in the regime in which the system Hamiltonian can be mapped onto a Josephson junction array. In an approximate scheme where the couplings are assumed uniform, the ground state energy is formulated in terms of the vortex configuration. Application of the method for the ladder case presented and the results are compared with Monte-Carlo method.     

Polyelectrolyte Nanocomposite Membranes Using Imidazole-Functionalized Nanosilica for Fuel Cell Applications

The preparation and characterization of a new type of nanocomposite polyelectrolyte membrane, based on DuPont Nafion/imidazole-modified nanosilica (Im-Si), for direct methanol fuel cell applications is described. Related to the interactions between the protonated imidazole groups, grafted on the surface of nanosilica, and negatively charged sulfonic acid groups of Nafion, new electrostatic interactions can be formed in the interface of Nafion and Im-Si which result in both lower methanol permeability and also higher proton conductivity. Physical characteristics of these manufactured nanocomposite membranes were investigated by scanning electron microscopy, thermogravimetry analysis, differential scanning calorimetry, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, water uptake, methanol permeability, and ion-exchange capacity, as well as proton conductivity. The Nafion/Im-Si membranes showed higher proton conductivity, lower methanol permeability and, as a consequence, higher selectivity parameter in comparison to the neat Nafion or Nafion/silica membranes. The obtained results indicated that the Nafion/Im-Si membranes could be utilized as promising polyelectrolyte membranes for direct methanol fuel cell applications.     

An improved ensemble learning machine for biological activity prediction of tyrosine kinase inhibitors

Boosting is one of the most important strategies in ensemble learning because of its ability to improve the stability and performance of weak learners. It is nonparametric, multivariate, fast and interpretable but is not robust against outliers. To enhance its prediction accuracy as well as immunize it against outliers, a modified version of a boosting algorithm (AdaBoost R2) was developed and called AdaBoost R3. In the sampling step, extremum samples were added to the boosting set. In the robustness step, a modified Huber loss function was applied to overcome the outlier problem. In the output step, a deterministic threshold was used to guarantee that bad predictions do not participate in the final output. The performance of the modified algorithm was investigated with two anticancer data sets of tyrosine kinase inhibitors, and the mechanism of inhibition was studied using the relative weighted variable importance procedure. Investigating the effect of base learner's strength reveals that boosting is only successful using the classification and regression tree method (a weak to moderate learner) and does not have a significant effect using the radial basis functions partial least square method (a strong base learners). Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Trimethylsilylation of Alcohols and Phenols,and Direct Acetylation of Silyl Ethers Catalyzed by Fe(ClO4)3.6H2O

In this article, a mild and efficient protocol for the trimethylsilylation of various aliphatic and benzylic alcohols and phenols with trimethylsilyl chloride using a catalytic amount of ferric perchlorate at room temperature and relatively short reaction times in good to excellent yields is reported. Direct acetylation of trimethylsilyl ethers catalyzed with Fe(ClO ₄ ) ₃ .6H ₂ O(0.02 mmol)/Fe(ClO ₄ ) ₃ SiO ₂ (0.2 g) using acetic anhydride at ambient temperature is also reported.     

Ab Initio Study of Structures,Metallotropic 1,2-Shifts and Prototropic 1,2-Shifts of Cyclopentadienyl(trimethyl)silane, -germane and -stannane

Molecular structures, metallotropic and prototropic shifts of cyclopentadienyl(trimethyl)silane ( 1 ), cyclopentadienyl(trimethyl)germane ( 2 ), and cyclopentadienyl(trimethyl)stannane ( 3 ) were investigated using ab initio molecular orbital and the Becke, Lee, Yang, and Parr density functional (B3LYP) methods. The results show that the most stable structure of compounds 1-3 has the (CH 3 ) 3 M fragment in the allylic position. The energy barrier of metallotropic shifts in compound 1 is higher than in 2 , and in compound 2 higher than in 3 , in good agreement with experimental data. The cyclopentadienyl rings in compounds 1-3 are found to be planar but this result contradicts the reported experimental data.     

FACILE REDUCTION OF AROMATIC NITRO COMPOUNDS WITH HYDROIODIC ACID UNDER MICROWAVE IRRADIATION ON SOLID SUPPORT

Reduction of aromatic nitro compounds to amine with hydroiodic acid was revisited. Under microwave irradiation on solid support the reduction proceeded efficiently and rapidly.