Improvement in Uranium Adsorption Properties of Amidoxime-Based Adsorbent Through Cografting of Amine Group

Amidoxime (AO)/amine co-functionalized polypropylene fiber adsorbents were prepared. The all-polymeric structures were characterized by using Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), optical microscope, contact angle meter and electron spin resonance (ESR) analysis methods, confirming the grafting, modification, and amidoximation stages gravimetrically, spectroscopically, and visually. The properties for the removal of uranyl(VI) from aqueous solutions were investigated. For amidoxime (AO) fiber, high adsorption rate was observed within the first 30 minutes and the plateau value of 40.6% uranium loading (0.0812 mg/g) was reached at around 30 minutes. The adsorption equilibrium for AO/amine fiber was attained within 20 minutes, resulting in the adsorption of 92.6% uranium loading (0.185 mg/g). The percentage of adsorption increases with increasing pH value (2–6), reaches a maximum at pH 6.0 and then remains almost constant for AO/amine fiber, whereas reduces slightly for AO fiber.     

Isolation and Characterization of Urethanase from Penicillium variabile and Its Application to Reduce Ethyl Carbamate Contamination in Chinese Rice Wine

A strain with urethanase activity was isolated from mouse gastrointestine. By combination of morphological characterization of the colony, hyphae, and spore and the sequence analysis of its rDNA ITS, the strain was determined as Penicillium variabile and named as P. variabile JN-A525. The enzymatic properties of urethanase from P. variabile JN-A525 were further studied. The optimum temperature and pH value of urethanase are of 50 °C and 6.0, respectively. The enzyme maintains stability when the temperature is below 50 °C and the pH is in the range of 7.0–10.0. The enzyme also exhibits ethanol tolerance. It can remove ethyl carbamate from Chinese rice wine without the change of flavor substances in the wine.     

Assessing the multisite binding properties of multiple sources of dissolved organic matter at nanomolar copper concentrations using piecewise linear regression and parallel factor analysis of fluorescence quenching

This study reports on the development and application of a piecewise linear model for the determination of copper-binding parameters at concentrations in the nanomolar range using fluorescence quenching. l-Tyrosine, Suwannee River natural organic matter, and two leaf leachates with similar fluorescence signatures were used as test compounds, and results were compared with those of the standard Ryan–Weber model. The piecewise model was also applied to and compared with data from an earlier study. Parallel factor analysis (PARAFAC) was used to identify three to five independent fluorophores in each test compound, and copper-binding parameters were estimated for one to three binding sites for each fluorophore. The binding properties of similar and different fluorophores were also compared. The conditional binding strengths (log K′) estimated using the piecewise approach were similar to those obtained using the Ryan–Weber approach (p?>?0.05); however, the piecewise linear model provided superior results compared to models based on the Ryan–Weber equation in several ways, including (1) capable of distinguishing more binding sites for a single fluorophore, (2) capable of extracting binding parameters at environmentally relevant, nanomolar concentrations of copper, where fluorescence changes are often observed as enhancement, (3) greater precision over repeated titrations, and (4) no severe underestimation of complexing capacities. Finally, the copper-binding properties of PARAFAC components with similar optical signatures were found to be similar, both in sources with dramatically different and similar total fluorescence signatures.

SYNTHESES,CRYSTAL STRUCTURES,AND ANTIMICROBIAL ACTIVITIES OF ZINC COMPLEXES DERIVED FROM 2-AMINO-N′- (PYRIDIN-2-YLMETHYLENE)BENZOHYDRAZIDE

Journal of Structural Chemistry - New zinc complexes, [ZnBr2(HL)] (1), [ZnBr(HL)(NCS)]·0.5H2O (2), [Zn(HL)I2] (3), and [ZnL2] (4), where L is the monoanionic form of...     

Encapsulation of Phosphomolybdate Within Metal–Organic Frameworks with Dual Enzyme-like Activities for Colorimetric Detection of H2O2 and Ascorbic acid

Developing artificial enzyme mimetics for the detection of small biomolecules are a current research interest because natural enzymes bear some serious disadvantages, such as their catalytic activity can be easily inhibited and they can be digested by proteases. Herein, a heteropoly acids (HPA) encapsulating metal–organic framework (MOF) with metal-carbene structure, [Cu₁₀(H₃trz)₄(Htrz)₄][PMo₁₂VO₄₁] (PMA-MOF) as bifunctional enzyme-mimetic catalyst for colorimetric detection of hydrogen peroxide (H₂O₂) and ascorbic acid (AA) was designed and synthesized. Thanks to the good stability and the synergistic effect of PMA and MOF, PMA-MOF exhibits the lower limit of detection (0.222 μM towards H₂O₂ and 0.0046 μM to AA), and the smaller Km value (0.0138 mM for H₂O₂ and 0.136 mM for o-phenylenediamine) compared to most reported MOF- and HPA-based enzyme-mimetic catalyst, to the best our knowledge.

     

pH‐controlled reaction divergence of decarboxylation versus fragmentation in reactions of dihydroxyfumarate with glyoxylate and formaldehyde: parallels to biological pathways

The reactions of dihydroxyfumarate with glyoxylate and formaldehyde exhibit a unique pH‐controlled mechanistic divergence leading to different product suites by two distinct pathways. The divergent reactions proceed via a central intermediate (2,3‐dihydroxy‐oxalosuccinate, 3 , in the reaction with glyoxylate and 2‐hydroxy‐2‐hydroxymethyl‐3‐oxosuccinate, 14 , in the reaction with formaldehyde). At pH 7–8, products ( 7 , 8 , and 15 ) exclusively from a decarboxylation of the intermediate are observed, while at pH 13–14, products ( 9 , 10 , and 16 ) solely derived from a hydroxide‐promoted fragmentation of the intermediate are formed. The decarboxylative and fragmentation pathways are mutually exclusive and do not appear to coexist under the range of pH (7–14) conditions investigated. Herein, we employ a combination of quantitative ¹³C NMR measurements and density functional theory calculations to provide a rationale for this pH‐driven reaction divergence. These rationalizations also hold true for the reactions of dihydroxyfumarate produced in situ by the catalytic cyanide‐mediated dimerization of glyoxylate. In addition, the non‐enzymatic decarboxylation and fragmentation transformations of these central intermediates ( 3 and 14 ) appear to have intriguing parallels to the enzymatic reactions of oxalosuccinate and formation of glyceric acid derivatives in extant metabolism – the high and low pH mimicking the precise control exerted by the enzymes over reaction pathways. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Multi-Center Vector Field Methods for Wave Equations

We develop the method of vector-fields to further study Dispersive Wave Equations. Radial vector fields are used to get a-priori estimates such as the Morawetz estimate on solutions of Dispersive Wave Equations. A key to such estimates is the repulsiveness or nontrapping conditions on the flow corresponding to the wave equation. Thus this method is limited to potential perturbations which are repulsive, that is the radial derivative pointing away from the origin. In this work, we generalize this method to include potentials which are repulsive relative to a line in space (in three or higher dimensions), among other cases. This method is based on constructing multi-centered vector fields as multipliers, cancellation lemmas and energy localization.     

Enhanced superprism effect based on positive/negative lateral shift of reflective beam in a Fabry-Perot filter

It is found that when a light beam is incident obliquely on a thin film Fabry-Perot filter (FPF) from different incident media (air or substrate), the reflective beam will be shifted in both the forward and the backward directions. Based on this inverted spatial dispersion effect, two thin film FPFs with different directional lateral shifts are assembled to get a thin film superprism with a wider dispersion band. The thin film samples are fabricated as well as tested, and the results are in approximate agreement with numerical simulation.     

Critical behavior of a passively mode-locked laser: rational harmonic mode locking

The critical behavior of passive mode locking has been demonstrated in a figure-eight fiber laser that performs rational harmonic mode locking (RHML). On both the repetition rate and the pulse amplitude distribution, the observed pulse trains near the threshold exhibit the same regulations as the rational harmonic mode-locked ones. The theory also shows that there should be a middle status of RHML before achieving normal mode locking. It is important to note that the results provide what we believe to be the first confirmed attempt to address a fundamental question: how does a laser become mode locking with an increase of pump power?     

In situ synthesis of CdS/ZnS composite nanoparticles from ZIF-8 for visible light disposal of Cr(VI)

Journal of Sol-Gel Science and Technology - Zeolitic Imidazolate Framework (ZIF-8) micropolyhedra were employed as a raw material for the synthesis of fine cadmium sulfide/zinc sulfide (CdS/ZnS)...