Tandem silylformylation-allyl(crotyl)silylation: a new approach to polyketide synthesis

Tandem intramolecular silylformylation-allyl(crotyl)silylation reactions have been developed that allow the highly efficient synthesis of polyketide fragments. The substrates are subjected to Rh(I)-catalyzed silylformylation to afford β-(diallyl)silyl aldehydes which undergo spontaneous uncatalyzed allylsilylation. This unusual spontaneous allylsilylation reaction is driven by strain release Lewis acidity, which arises from the ∼95° O-Si-C bond angle in the oxasilacyclopentane product of the silylformylation reaction. The methodology has been developed both for alkene and alkyne substrates, may be used to establish as many as three stereocenters, and has been shown to be amenable to use in an iterative fashion.     

Accurate Gain Flattening Filters Manufactured by Optical Compensation Monitoring Method

GFFs with less than 0.4 dB peak-to-peak error functions are routinely fabricated using commercially available coating machines by utilizing the natural error compensation mechanism of wavelength variable turning point optical monitoring method.     

Role of water vapor and CO2 in the paleoclimatic fluctuations along northwestern and southern Syria, and the adjacent Mediterranean Sea

Microscopic petrified grains were collected from a mafic–ultramafic pipe, NE of Dreikeesh, NW Syria. The grains were identified as anthers/gynoecia in herb/grass flowers. Three of the grains showed evidence of magnetism, two slowly dissolved in concentrated HCl, and three microprobed grains showed a montmorillonitic composition. Iron originating from pyroxene was oxidized to magnetite. Released silica formed the mineral suite agate–chalcedony–opal. Warm/cold paleoclimatic fluctuations, occurring during late Pliocene–Holocene, depended on water vapor, CO₂ production, and cinders in the atmosphere. Most of these were associated with changing volcanic/tectonic events. Fluctuations were controlled by heat reflected from the Earth's surface being absorbed by water vapor and CO₂, which both re-reflected the heat back to the surface, thus, raising the temperature. This cycle was repeated several times during late Pliocene–Holocene.     

An effective modeling and solution approach for the generalized independent set problem

The generalized independent set (GIS) problem was first introduced by Hochbaum and Pathria (Forest Sci 43(4), 544–554, 1997) and independently explored in greater detail by Hochbaum (Manage Sci 50(6), 709–123, 2004). This problem, with applications in forest management and a variety of related areas, is a generalization of the classical maximum independent set problem. In this paper we highlight a natural, nonlinear formulation for the problem that is an attractive alternative to the linear model found in the literature. The effectiveness of this alternative formulation is demonstrated by computational experience on test problems of varying size and density, disclosing a dramatic reduction in the time to obtain optimal and near optimal solutions and an ability to solve much larger problems.     

Difference Sets and Recursion Theory

There is a recursive set of natural numbers which is the difference set of some recursively enumerable set but which is not the difference set of any recursive set.     

Un théorème de type Beurling–Lax dans la boule unitéA Beurling–Lax type theorem in the unit ball

We prove a Beurling–Lax theorem for a family of reproducing kernel Hilbert spaces of functions analytic in an open subset of the unit ball containing the origin. The spaces under consideration are characterized by functions called Schur multipliers. Using the theory of linear relations in Pontryagin spaces we also give coisometric realizations of Schur multipliers. To cite this article: D. Alpay et al., C. R. Acad. Sci. Paris, Ser. I 334 (2002) 349–354.     

Chiral phase transition and Anderson localization in the instanton liquid model for QCD

We study the spectrum and eigenmodes of the QCD Dirac operator in a gauge background given by an instanton liquid model (ILM) at temperatures around the chiral phase transition. Generically we find the Dirac eigenvectors become more localized as the temperature is increased. At the chiral phase transition, both the low lying eigenmodes and the spectrum of the QCD Dirac operator undergo a transition to localization similar to the one observed in a disordered conductor. This suggests that Anderson localization is the fundamental mechanism driving the chiral phase transition. We also find an additional temperature dependent mobility edge (separating delocalized from localized eigenstates) in the bulk of the spectrum which moves toward lower eigenvalues as the temperature is increased. In both regions, the origin and the bulk, the transition to localization exhibits features of a 3D Anderson transition including multifractal eigenstates and spectral properties that are well described by critical statistics. Similar results are obtained in both the quenched and the unquenched case though the critical temperature in the unquenched case is lower. Finally we argue that our findings are not in principle restricted to the ILM approximation and may also be found in lattice simulations.     

Characterization of heat-assisted magnetic probe recording on CoNi/Pt multilayers

A method of heat-assisted magnetic recording (HAMR) potentially suitable for probe-based storage systems is characterized. In this work, field emission current from a scanning tunneling microscope (STM) tip is used as the heating source. Pulse voltages of 2–7 V were applied to a CoNi/Pt multilayered film fabricated on either bare silicon or oxidized silicon substrates. Different types of Ir/Pt and W STM tips were used in the experiment. The results show that thermally recorded magnetic marks are formed with a nearly uniform mark size of 170 nm on the film fabricated on bare silicon substrate when the pulse voltage is above a threshold voltage. The mark size becomes 260 nm when they are written on the identical film fabricated on an oxidized silicon substrate. The threshold voltage depends on the material work function of the tip, with W having a threshold voltage about 1 V lower than Pt. A synthesized model, which contains the calculation of the emission current, the simulation of heat transfer during heating, and the study of magnetic domain formation, was introduced to explain experimental results. The simulation agrees well with the experiments.