The phenomenon of conglomerate crystallization in coordination compounds. XXIII: The crystallization behavior of [cis-Co(en)2(N3)(SO3)] · 2H2O (I) and of [cis-Co(en)2(NO2)(SO3)] · H2O (II)

A room temperature water solution of (I) crystallizes as a racemate, space groupP2 ₁/n with lattice constantsa=7.737(6),b=10.694(5),c=15.097(6) Å, and=102.83(5)°;V=1218.05 ų andd (calc; M.W.=337.24, Z=4) = 1.642 g cm^–3. A total of 2381 data were collected over the range 4° 2 < 50°; of these, 1452 (independent and withI 3(I)) were used in the structural analysis. Data were corrected for absorption ( = 15.76 cm^–1), and the relative transmission coefficients ranged from 0.8976 to 0.9984. Refinement led to the finalR(F) andR _w(F) residuals of 0.0858 and 0.1116. A room temperature water solution of (II) crystallizes as a racemate in space group P2₁/c with lattice constantsa=6.638(3),b=11.425(8),c=15.147(16) Å, and=93.27(6)°; F=1146.8 Å andd (calc; M.W.=323.2,Z=4) = 1.872 g cm^–3. A total of 2200 data were collected over the range 4° 2 < 50°; of these, 1918 (independent and withI 3(I)) were used in the structural analysis. Data were corrected for absorption (=16.94 cm^–1), and the relative transmission coefficients ranged from 0.9049 to 0.9967. Refinement led to the finalR(F) andR _w(F) residuals of 0.0231 and 0.0279. The chirality symbol for the particular enantiomer of (I) refined here is (), while for (II) the chirality symbol is (), which means that in the latter compound one of the en rings is in a higher energy conformation. We attribute this result to competitive intramolecular hydrogen-bonded interactions between the — NH₂ hydrogens of the en ligands and the oxygens of the -NO₂ and -SO₃ ligands, strengths which are enhanced by coercing a change in sign of the torsional angle of one en ringa motion which permits both oxo ligands to form stronger hydrogen bonds while retaining proper O O contacts. This phenomenon is not observed in (I) since the azide ligand does not compete with -SO₃ for such hydrogen-bonded interactions, and nonbonded pair repulsions can be minimized without affecting the ability of — SO₃ oxygens to form strong intramolecular hydrogen bonds.     

Drag of a Solid Particle Trapped in a Thin Film or at an Interface: Influence of Surface Viscosity and Elasticity

We propose a theoretical model for the motion of a spherical particle entrapped in a thin liquid film or in a monolayer of insoluble surfactant at the air/water interface. Both surface shear and dilational viscosity, surface diffusion, and elasticity of the film are taken into consideration. The drag force acting on the particle is analytically calculated and asymptotic expressions of the problem are provided. The relevance of the model is discussed by comparing the calculated "viscoelastic" drag, gamma(vel), to the one predicted by Saffman's theory, gamma(S), for cylindrical inclusions in membranes. Numerical analyses are performed to evaluate the contributions of the surface viscosity and the diffusion coefficient of the layer on the hydrodynamical resistance experienced by the particle. Copyright 2000 Academic Press.     

Designing 129Xe NMR biosensors for matrix metalloproteinase detection

Xenon-129 biosensors offer an attractive alternative to conventional MRI contrast agents due to the chemical shift sensitivity and large nuclear magnetic signal of hyperpolarized (129)Xe. Here, we report the first enzyme-responsive (129)Xe NMR biosensor. This compound was synthesized in 13 steps by attaching the consensus peptide substrate for matrix metalloproteinase-7 (MMP-7), an enzyme that is upregulated in many cancers, to the xenon-binding organic cage, cryptophane-A. The final coupling step was achieved on solid support in 80-92% yield via a copper (I)-catalyzed [3+2] cycloaddition. In vitro enzymatic cleavage assays were monitored by HPLC and fluorescence spectroscopy. The biosensor was determined to be an excellent substrate for MMP-7 (K(M) = 43 microM, V(max) = 1.3 x 10(-)(8) M s(-1), k(cat)/K(M) = 7,200 M(-1) s(-1)). Enzymatic cleavage of the tryptophan-containing peptide led to a dramatic decrease in Trp fluorescence, lambda(max) = 358 nm. Stern-Volmer analysis gave an association constant of 9000 +/- 1,000 M(-1) at 298 K between the cage and Trp-containing hexapeptide under enzymatic assay conditions. Most promisingly, (129)Xe NMR spectroscopy distinguished between the intact and cleaved biosensors with a 0.5 ppm difference in chemical shift. This difference most likely reflected a change in the electrostatic environment of (129)Xe, caused by the cleavage of three positively charged residues from the C-terminus. This work provides guidelines for the design and application of new enzyme-responsive (129)Xe NMR biosensors.     

Polar properties of hydrothermally synthesized BiFeO3 thin films

Multiferroic bismuth ferrite (BiFeO₃) has attracted considerable attention due to applications related to the bulk photovoltaic effect in which the direction of polarization determines the direction of the photocurrent. Epitaxial thin films are produced by means of techniques that usually require high temperature processes. The hydrothermal method can be seen as an alternative route to obtain highly textured thin films in quantities compatible with batch processing; nevertheless, the structural, dielectric and electric properties are generally affected by the presence of hydrogen and other reaction by-products. In this work, functional and highly textured BiFeO₃ films were successfully produced on metallic SrTiO₃:Nb (0.5 wt.%) (100) substrates via hydrothermal synthesis. X-ray diffraction (XRD) and Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM) were used to analyze the structural properties of the films. Piezoresponse Force Microscopy (PFM) and Photoconductive Atomic Force Microscopy (Pc-AFM) were used to determine their functional properties. We show the polarization switching and confirm the presence of the bulk photovoltaic effect for the first time in hydrothermally synthesized BiFeO₃.     

A new method for finding cycles by semilinear control

In the paper two new results that prove typically real and local univalent properties of certain class of rational functions in the unit disc $\mathbb{D}$ are presented. They provide a theoretical justification of a new method for finding periodic solutions of the discrete vector dynamical systems. The main goal of the paper is to propose and investigate the two-delays generalization of the scheme introduced by Ö. Morgül. The analysis shows that the coefficients in the proposed method can be chosen in a way that improves the admissible range of parameters. The method is elementary and easy to implement. Furthermore, numerical experiments with several well known maps show effectiveness of the control scheme.     

Synthesis of new pharmacologically oriented heterocyclic ensembles, [2-(1H-pyrazol-1-yl)thiazol-4-yl]furoxans

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A radiolabelling study of radicals derived from benzene, toluene and benzaldehyde sorbed in model environmental carbon

Radiolabelled free radicals were formed by the addition of muonium--a radioactive hydrogen atom with a positive muon as its nucleus--to benzene, toluene and benzaldehyde, as sorbed in porous carbon. The activation parameters associated with their reorientational motion were measured using longitudinal-field muon spin relaxation (LF-MuSRx). Two distinct sorbed fractions were detected in each sample, characterised by molecular reorientational activation energies of 5.9/25.8 kJ/mol for benzene, 2.5/5.9 kJ/mol for toluene and 2.9/11.5 kJ/mol for benzaldehyde.     

An algorithmic representation of fractional powers of positive operators

We are concerned with a new representation of fractional powers of operators by a series using exclusively contractive operators or operators with uniformly bounded powers. This representation is suitable for the construction of efficient approximations for which the error estimates are given and the convergence is investigated. The rate of convergence turns out to be exponential for bounded operators and polynomial for unbounded operators     

The Peano phenomenon for Itô equations

The weak convergence of the measures generated by the solutions of stochastic Itô equations with low diffusion is studied, as the diffusion tends to zero. It is proved that the limiting measure in the presence of the Peano phenomenon for a relevant ordinary differential equation is concentrated on its extreme solutions with definite weights. The formulas for their calculation are given.