Metal complexes of chiral pyridine ligands. X-ray structure of nitratobis {2-(2S)-2-pyrrolidinyl]pyridine} copper (II) nitrate

Cobalt(II), nickel(II), and copper(II) complexes of 2-[(2S)-2-pyrrolidinyllpyridine (L) have been synthesized and characterized. The crystal structure of the complex [Cu(L)₂(NO₃)]NO₃ has been determined by X-ray diffraction. Crystals are monoclinic, space groupP2+, witha=10.766(3).b=7.525(2),c=13.447(4) Å. =104.64(2)°. and Z=2. The structure consists of [Cu(L)₂(NO₃)]⁺ cations and NO ₃ ^t- anions. The copper atom has a distorted trigonal bipyramidal coordination geometry with the two pyrrolidine nitrogens and one nitrate oxygen occupying the equatorial positions and the two pyridine nitrogens at the apices. The crystalline cohesion is ensured by a network of hydrogen bonds involving the pyrrolidine groups as donors and both coordinate and uncoordinate nitrates as acceptors.     

Efficient and sustainable V-catalyzed oxidative desulfurization of fuels assisted by ionic liquids

Fuel desulfurization is an appealing topic for the chemical industry since severe environmental regulations regarding SO₂ emissions have been legislated in many countries. In order to reduce the amount of sulfur-containing compounds in fuels, responsible for high SO_x emission levels, a green chemistry approach is compulsory. In this paper, vanadium salen and salophen complexes were used in the oxidation of a model aromatic sulfide, such as dibenzothiophene (DBT), in the presence of H₂O₂ as green oxidant. The oxidative process was successfully coupled with the extraction of the oxidized compounds by ionic liquids. The system resulted highly selective for sulfide oxidation, showing poor reactivity toward the oxidation of alkenes and allowing a significant reduction of S content in a model benzine. To note, the use of microwave in place of standard heating allowed to obtain 98% of DBT oxidation and almost complete sulfur extraction in the model fuel in 1000 s. For these reasons, this system was considered an easy, rapid and clean process to achieve fuel desulfurization.     

Extending homeomorphisms from punctured surfaces to handlebodies

Let Hg be a genus g handlebody and MCG2n(Tg) be the group of the isotopy classes of orientation preserving homeomorphisms of Tg=∂Hg, fixing a given set of 2n points. In this paper we find a finite set of generators for , the subgroup of MCG2n(Tg) consisting of the isotopy classes of homeomorphisms of Tg admitting an extension to the handlebody and keeping fixed the union of n disjoint properly embedded trivial arcs. This result generalizes a previous one obtained by the authors for n=1. The subgroup turns out to be important for the study of knots and links in closed 3-manifolds via (g,n)-decompositions. In fact, the links represented by the isotopy classes belonging to the same left cosets of in MCG2n(Tg) are equivalent.     

Weighted $${{L^p}}$$-Liouville theorems for hypoelliptic partial differential operators on Lie groups

We prove weighted \({L^p}\)-Liouville theorems for a class of second-order hypoelliptic partial differential operators \({\mathcal{L}}\) on Lie groups \({\mathbb{G}}\) whose underlying manifold is \({n}\)-dimensional space. We show that a natural weight is the right-invariant measure \(\check{H}\) of \({\mathbb{G}}\). We also prove Liouville-type theorems for \({C^{2}}\) subsolutions in \({L^{p}(\mathbb{G},\check{H})}\). We provide examples of operators to which our results apply, jointly with an application to the uniqueness for the Cauchy problem for the evolution operator \({\mathcal{L}-\partial_{t}}\).     

The occurrence of phenyl propanoid glycosides in endemic Teucrium species

The phenyl propanoid fraction of Teucrium subspinosum Pourrette ex Willd. (Lamiaceae) from Baleari Island, was examined together with the same fraction of T. subspinosum from Sardinia. In T. subspinosum, besides verbascoside as main component, a new phenyl-propanoid-glycoside was isolated and identified by (1)H- and (13)C-NMR spectra analysis. Comparison with molecular composition of T. marum confirmed the differences between these species and evidenced their endemic character.     

Link of groups and homogeneous Hörmander operators

We study a notion of link of Lie groups suggested by the structure of the partial differential operators of Kolmogorov type. As an application of our link procedure we construct explicit examples of stratified Lie groups, with dimension and step arbitrarily large. We also give a set of examples of hypoelliptic second-order operators which are left translation invariant and homogeneous of degree two on the previous groups.

     

Cyclodextrin Polymers as Delivery Systems for Targeted Anti-Cancer Chemotherapy

In the few last years, nanosystems have emerged as a potential therapeutic approach to improve the efficacy and selectivity of many drugs. Cyclodextrins (CyDs) and their nanoparticles have been widely investigated as drug delivery systems. The covalent functionalization of CyD polymer nanoparticles with targeting molecules can improve the therapeutic potential of this family of nanosystems. In this study, we investigated cross-linked γ- and β-cyclodextrin polymers as carriers for doxorubicin (ox) and oxaliplatin (Oxa). We also functionalized γ-CyD polymer bearing COOH functionalities with arginine-glycine-aspartic or arginine moieties for targeting the integrin receptors of cancer cells. We tested the Dox and Oxa anti-proliferative activity in the presence of the precursor polymer with COOH functionalities and its derivatives in A549 (lung, carcinoma) and HepG2 (liver, carcinoma) cell lines. We found that CyD polymers can significantly improve the antiproliferative activity of Dox in HepG2 cell lines only, whereas the cytotoxic activity of Oxa resulted as enhanced in both cell lines. The peptide or amino acid functionalized CyD polymers, loaded with Dox, did not show any additional effect compared to the precursor polymer. Finally, studies of Dox uptake showed that the higher antiproliferative activity of complexes correlates with the higher accumulation of Dox inside the cells. The results show that CyD polymers could be used as carriers for repositioning classical anticancer drugs such as Dox or Oxa to increase their antitumor activity.     

Key role of molecular kinetic energy in early stages of pentacene island growth

Organic molecular beam deposition is studied systematically at thermal and hyperthermal regimes aiming at investigating the role of molecular kinetic energy on the growth mechanism of pentacene submonolayers on SiO _x /Si. We show that the kinetic energy of the impinging molecule (E _k ) plays a crucial role in determining island structure and shape, distribution of island sizes, the crystalline quality of the first monolayer, and even the growth mode of subsequent layers. With increasing E _k , the island structure changes from fractal to nonfractal, the shape becomes more anisotropic and the island size more uniform, pointing to correlated island growth. Moreover, while 3D island growth is observed for thermal organic molecular beam deposition, supersonic molecular beam deposition gives rise to layer-by-layer growth, at least for the first two layers. When E _k ≥5.0 eV, the first monolayer is composed of large single crystalline domains which can extend over up to 10 μm, inferred from comparing atomic force micrographs of height and net transverse shear force. In these growth conditions both the high surface diffusivity and energy redistribution play a major role. We propose a mechanism where the energy dissipation occurring during the molecule–surface collision leads to the reorientation of whole islands during island coalescence, resulting in the elimination of grain boundaries.