Evidence for weak itinerant long-range magnetic correlations in UGe2

Positive muon spin relaxation measurements performed on the ferromagnet UGe2 reveal, in addition to the well-known localized 5f-electron density responsible for the bulk magnetic properties, the existence of itinerant quasistatic magnetic correlations. Their critical dynamics is well described by the conventional dipolar Heisenberg model. These correlations involve small magnetic moments.     

Efficient one-pot synthesis of the 2-aminocarbonylpyrrolidin-4-ylthio-containing side chain of the new broad-spectrum carbapenem antibiotic ertapenem

An efficient synthesis of the 2-aminocarbonylpyrrolidin-4-ylthio containing side chain of ertapenem (MK-0826) is described. Starting material N-(O,O-diisopropyl phosphoryl)-trans-4-hydroxy-L-proline is converted in a one-pot process to (2S)-cis-3-[[(4-mercapto-2-pyrrolidinyl)carbonyl]amino]benzoic acid monohydrochloride in 70-75% overall yield via a series of six reactions. The development of each of these reactions and the isolation of the product is discussed in detail.     

Electron localization in a disordered insulating host

Transport of excess electrons has been studied in solid N2-Ar mixtures between 5 and 60 K using muon spin rotation in magnetic and electric fields. At low temperatures, orientational frustration of N2 molecular quadrupoles by a sufficiently high concentration of Ar atoms leads to formation of a quadrupolar glass phase in which electrons are found to be strongly localized. This feature is in marked contrast to the electron delocalization observed in the low-temperature alpha phase of pure solid nitrogen, which shows long-range orientational order.     

Dynamics and reactivity of positively charged muonium in heavily doped Si:B and comparisons with hydrogen

The detailed dynamics of the positively charged muonium (Mu+) in heavily doped p-type Si:B is reported. Below 200 K, Mu+ is static and isolated, and is located in a stretched Si-Si bond. Above approximately 200 K, Mu+ diffuses incoherently. At temperatures higher than 300 K, the Mu+-B- complex is formed while above 520 K, it starts to dissociate. There is significant enhancement of the diffusion of Mu+ in Si compared to H+ and D+-this is attributed to its smaller mass.     

Model-based clustering of high-dimensional data streams with online mixture of probabilistic PCA

Model-based clustering is a popular tool which is renowned for its probabilistic foundations and its flexibility. However, model-based clustering techniques usually perform poorly when dealing with high-dimensional data streams, which are nowadays a frequent data type. To overcome this limitation of model-based clustering, we propose an online inference algorithm for the mixture of probabilistic PCA model. The proposed algorithm relies on an EM-based procedure and on a probabilistic and incremental version of PCA. Model selection is also considered in the online setting through parallel computing. Numerical experiments on simulated and real data demonstrate the effectiveness of our approach and compare it to state-of-the-art online EM-based algorithms.     

Muonium Chemistry at Diiron Subsite Analogues of [FeFe]‐Hydrogenase

The chemistry of metal hydrides is implicated in a range of catalytic processes at metal centers. Gaining insight into the formation of such sites by protonation and/or electronation is therefore of significant value in fully exploiting the potential of such systems. Here, we show that the muonium radical (Mu^.), used as a low isotopic mass analogue of hydrogen, can be exploited to probe the early stages of hydride formation at metal centers. Mu^. undergoes the same chemical reactions as H^. and can be directly observed due to its short lifetime (in the microseconds) and unique breakdown signature. By implanting Mu^. into three models of the [FeFe]‐hydrogenase active site we have been able to detect key muoniated intermediates of direct relevance to the hydride chemistry of these systems.     

Enhancement of second harmonic generation efficiency: Cs(I)-doped tris(thiourea)zinc(II) sulphate crystals

The effect of dopant cesium (Cs(I)) over a concentration range from 1 to 10 mol% on the growth process, morphology, thermal and optical properties of tri(thiourea)zinc(II) sulfate (ZTS) single crystals grown by slow evaporation solution growth technique has been investigated. Incorporation of Cs(I) into the crystal lattice was well confirmed by energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDS). The lattice parameters of the as-grown crystals were obtained by single crystal X-ray diffraction analysis. The reduction in the intensities observed in powder X-ray diffraction patterns of doped specimen and slight shifts in vibrational frequencies in fourier transform infrared spectra (FT-IR) indicate the lattice stress as a result of doping. Thermal studies reveal the purity of the material and no decomposition is observed up to the melting point. High transmittance is observed in the visible region and the cut-off λ is ～280 nm. The surface morphology of the as-grown specimens was studied by scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The second harmonic generation (SHG) efficiency of the host crystal is enhanced greatly in the presence of high concentrations of the dopant.