Spin-spin interaction between phenyl nitroxides through the σ-π system

The spin states of a series of silicon- and carbon-bridged phenyl nitroxides were examined with respect to the temperature dependent ESR and SQUID measurements. Of those, a linear relationship between the ESR signal intensity and 1/T (T = absolute temperature) and an increase of χ_molT along lowering T were observed for a compound having disilanylene-bridged m- and p-phenyl nitroxide units (Si2mp), indicating ferromagnetic spin-spin interaction in this molecule. In contrast to this, no clear intramolecular spin-spin interaction took place in the monosilanylene analogue (Si1mp). Mono- and disilanylene-bridged phenylnitroxides with p-, p- or m-, m-substitution (Si1pp,Si1mm, Si1pp, and Si2mm) exhibited the singlet ground state. The trisilanylene and siloxanylene bridges did not play an obvious role in the spin interaction, in either a ferro- or antiferromagnetic fashion, regardless of the substitution modes of the phenylenes. MO calculations on the model compounds provided a mechanistic interpretation for the high-spin interaction through the σ-π system.     

Searching ultimate nanometrology for AlOx thickness in magnetic tunnel junction by analytical electron microscopy and X-ray reflectometry.

Practical analyses of the structures of ultrathin multilayers in tunneling magneto resistance (TMR) and Magnetic Random Access Memory (MRAM) devices have been a challenging task because layers are very thin, just 1-2 nm thick. Particularly, the thinness (approximately 1 nm) and chemical properties of the AlOx barrier layer are critical to its magnetic tunneling property. We focused on evaluating the current TEM analytical methods by measuring the thickness and composition of an AlOx layer using several TEM instruments, that is, a round robin test, and cross-checked the thickness results with an X-ray reflectometry (XRR) method. The thickness measured by using HRTEM, HAADF-STEM, and zero-loss images was 1.1 nm, which agreed with the results from the XRR method. On the other hand, TEM-EELS measurements showed 1.8 nm for an oxygen 2D-EELS image and 3.0 nm for an oxygen spatially resolved EELS image, whereas the STEM-EDS line profile showed 2.5 nm in thickness. However, after improving the TEM-EELS measurements by acquiring time-resolved images, the measured thickness of the AlOx layer was improved from 1.8 nm to 1.4 nm for the oxygen 2D-EELS image and from 3.0 nm to 2.0 nm for the spatially resolved EELS image, respectively. Also the observed thickness from the EDS line profile was improved to 1.4 nm after more careful optimization of the experimental parameters. We found that EELS and EDS of one-dimensional line scans or two-dimensional elemental mapping gave a larger AlOx thickness even though much care was taken. The reasons for larger measured values can be found from several factors such as sample drift, beam damage, probe size, beam delocalization, and multiple scattering for the EDS images, and chromatic aberration, diffraction limit due to the aperture, delocalization, alignment between layered direction in samples, and energy dispersion direction in the EELS instrument for EELS images. In the case of STEM-EDS mapping with focused nanoprobes, it is always necessary to reduce beam damage and sample drift while trying to maintain the signal-to-noise (S/N) ratio as high as possible. Also we confirmed that the time-resolved TEM-EELS acquisition technique improves S/N ratios of elemental maps without blurring the images.     

Enantioselective inclusion of amide guests into a chiral N,N′-ditrityl amino amide host to compensate the loss of hydrogen bonds broken by installation of trityl groups

A new crystalline N,N′-ditrityl amino amide host included several amide guests in the host cavity to form inclusion crystals. Although the installation of trityl groups into (S)-2-aminopropanamide broke its inherent hydrogen bonds of amide groups, inclusion of guest amides compensated the loss of hydrogen bonds. X-ray crystallography showed that these inclusion cavities and host–guest interactions such as hydrogen bonds, van der Waals interaction, and CH?O interactions play important roles for highly enantioselective inclusion. The enantiomeric inclusion was 67% ee (S-form) for N-phenyl 2-methylbutanamide, 82% ee (S-form) for N-phenyl 2-chlorobutanamide, and 83% ee (S-form) for N-phenyl 2-bromobutanamide.     

Guidelines proposed for designing organic ferromagnets by using a quantum chemical approach

For predicting the characteristics of organic ferromagnetic substances, we have previously proposed a simple rule for conjugated organic molecules based on molecular orbital coefficients by the simple Hückel??s nonbonding molecular orbital (NBMO) method. In this work, we extended the rule to systems including heteroatoms to become more widely applicable to various magnetic polymers. It was proven that the linkage between molecules having an NBMO conserves the original NBMO levels even for the supermolecule after the linkage. In addition, we have also proposed an index to estimate the amount of possessing ferromagnetic property. The reliability of the rule and index is examined by applying both the density functional theory (DFT) with functional methods, i.e., B3LYP, B3PW91, BLYP, PBEPBE, and PBEP86, and the complete active space SCF (CASSCF) calculations to several model molecules.     

Nickel (o)-catalyzed Cycloaddition of Ethoxyethyne with Carbon Dioxide to 4,5-diethoxy-α-pyrone

Ni(O)-phosphine(L) complexes (L=tri-n-alkylphosphines and bis(diphenylphosphino)butane) catalyzed the cycloaddition of ethoxyethyne and carbon dioxide to afford 4,5-diethoxy-α-pyrone regioselectively.     

Chiral Supramolecular Nanoarchitectures from Macroscopic Mechanical Rotations: Effects on Enantioselective Aggregation Behavior of Phthalocyanines

Fluid dynamics, resulting from the macroscopic mechanical rotation of either a rotary evaporator or a magnetic stirrer, has been shown to selectively induce one of two enantiomers (mirror‐image structures) in certain nanoscale supramolecules. As an alternative to giving a chiral twist to synthesized supramolecules or polymers, it is a challenge to reproducibly prepare chiral species by only using macroscopic mechanical rotations. Demonstrated here is a highly reproducible method for rotary‐evaporation‐induced enantioselective H‐aggregation of achiral phthalocyanines. Chiral induction mechanisms are proposed by using the chiroptical‐sign‐based absolute structures. These results will provide insight to the origin of the homochirality of life, and serves as a pioneering study in a novel scientific field in terms of admixing nanoscale molecular chemistry and macroscopic fluid dynamics.