Hydrophobic interaction membrane chromatography for plasmid DNA purification: Design and optimization

Chromatography is one of the key operations in the downstream processing of plasmid DNA (pDNA). However, the increased demand for highly purified pDNA experienced in recent years has made clear the need for alternative processes capable of retaining the advantages of conventional chromatography, such as selectivity, while providing increased throughput at a lower cost. The work presented in this article outlines the development and optimization of an alternative hydrophobic interaction membrane chromatography process for the purification of pDNA. The studies included the modification of functionalized membrane supports with a linear alkyl chain ligand and the testing of chromatographic performance of these membranes. Three modification procedures were tested and the membranes were screened for their capacity and selectivity. The modified membranes could separate the model plasmid pVAX1‐LacZ (6050 bp) from impurities in clarified Escherichia coli cell lysates (specifically RNA), with good resolution. Subsequent optimization of elution profiles with the best‐performing modified membrane, resulted in a high purification factor of 4.7, competitive with its bead process counterpart, and a plasmid yield of 73%.     

Electrochemical reactions at the electrode/solution interface:Theory and applications to water electrolysis and oxygen reduction

Theoretical simulations on complex electrochemical processes have been developed on the basis of the understanding in electrochemistry,which has benefited from quantum mechanics calculations.This article reviews the recent progress on the theory and applications in electrocatalysis.Two representative reactions,namely water electrolysis and oxygen reduction,are selected to illustrate how the theoretical methods are applied to electrocatalytic reactions.The microscopic nature of these electrochemical reaction...     

Fabrication of well‐aligned electrospun nanofibrous membrane based on fluorinated polyimide

We have fabricated novel nanofibrous fluorinated polyimide membranes on a specially designed collector, which is composed of conductive aluminum plates and glass insulator materials and can be removed from the apparatus, using an electrospinning method. We describe the structure and water flux properties of the nanofibrous fluorinated polyimide membranes. The electrospun nanofibers were deposited across the plates and uniaxially aligned to the collector. In addition, the multi‐layer stacked nanofibrous membranes, consisting of three‐dimensionally ordered nanopores, were produced. The pure water fluxes for the stacked membranes were measured, using a stirred dead‐end filtration cell, and were linearly decreased with an increasing deposition time, indicating that the nanopores formed in the nanofibrous membrane were further narrowed due to the regularly accumulated nanofibers. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

超临界水中甲酸降解过程实验研究

在550℃~650℃,24 MPa~30 MPa,反应停留16 s~46 s的条件下,对初始浓度0.05 mol/L~0.70 mol/L的甲酸溶液在超临界水中的降解过程进行实验研究。结果表明,甲酸降解的气体产物为H2、CO2和CO,其中H2、CO2为主要产物。高温有利于甲酸降解和H2生成。温度较高(600℃)时,压力变化对甲酸降解无明显影响。在一定范围内延长反应时间可提高气体产物中H2的体积分数和碳气化率。甲酸初始浓度对甲酸降解机理有重要影响,浓度较低(0.1 mol/L)时,甲酸降解主要包含脱羧反应和脱羰反应两条反应路径,其中脱羧反应为主反应路径;浓度较高时则有许多副反应发生。碱性添加剂不利于甲酸降解生成H2。     

纤维素在超临界水中的反应

纤维素是一种非常有价值的可再生资源,通过其反应可以获得多种有用的物质。对纤维素在超临界水中的反应进行了综述。在没有催化剂的情况下,纤维素在超临界水中水解生成葡萄糖、果糖、低聚物等;对纤维素水解的设备、产物分布以及纤维素水解反应机理进行了阐述。采用Ni,Pt,Ru,KOH等作催化剂,纤维素在超临界水中发生气化反应,生成的气体产物主要为H2,CO2和CH4;介绍了纤维素及其主要水解产物葡萄糖的制氢反应过程。对纤维素超临界水反应技术的发展前景进行了展望.     

Efficient nonbonded interactions for molecular dynamics on a graphics processing unit

We describe an algorithm for computing nonbonded interactions with cutoffs on a graphics processing unit. We have incorporated it into OpenMM, a library for performing molecular simulations on high‐performance computer architectures. We benchmark it on a variety of systems including boxes of water molecules, proteins in explicit solvent, a lipid bilayer, and proteins with implicit solvent. The results demonstrate that its performance scales linearly with the number of atoms over a wide range of system sizes, while being significantly faster than other published algorithms. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Comput Chem, 2010     

Pressurized hot water extraction (PHWE)

Pressurized hot water extraction (PHWE) has become a popular green extraction method for different classes of compounds present in numerous kinds of matrices such as environmental, food and botanical samples. PHWE is also used in sample preparation to extract organic contaminants from foodstuff for food safety analysis and soils/sediments for environmental monitoring purposes. The main parameters which influence its extraction efficiency are namely the temperature, extraction time, flow rates and addition of modifiers/additives. Among these different parameters studied, temperature is described as the most important one. It is reported that the extraction of certain compounds is rather dependent on pressurized water with different applied temperature. Thus, the stability and reduced solubilities of certain compounds at elevated temperatures are highlighted in this review. With some modifications, a scaled-up PHWE could extract a higher amount of desirable compounds from solid and powdered samples such as plant and food materials. The PHWE extracts from plants are rich in chemical compounds or metabolites which can be a potential lead for drug discovery or development of disease-resistant food crops.     

Ultrasound-assisted dispersive liquid–liquid microextraction for the determination of six pyrethroids in river water

A simple ultrasound-assisted dispersive liquid–liquid microextraction method combined with liquid chromatography was developed for the preconcentration and determination of six pyrethroids in river water samples. The procedure was based on a ternary solvent system to formatting tiny droplets of extractant in sample solution by dissolving appropriate amounts of water-immiscible extractant (tetrachloromethane) in watermiscible dispersive solvent (acetone). Various parameters that affected the extraction efficiency (such as type and volume of extraction and dispersive solvent, extraction time, ultrasonic time, and centrifuging time) were evaluated. Under the optimum condition, good linearity was obtained in a range of 0.00059–1.52 mg L⁻¹ for all analytes with the correlation coefficient (r²) > 0.999. Intra-assay and inter-assay precision evaluated as the relative standard deviation (RSD) were less than 3.4 and 8.9%. The recoveries of six pyrethroids at three spiked levels were in the range of 86.2–109.3% with RSD of less than 8.7%. The enrichment factors for the six pyrethroids were ranged from 767 to 1033 folds.     

Hydrogen Production by Water Dissociation in Surface‐Modified BaCoxFeyZr1−x−yO3−δ Hollow‐Fiber Membrane Reactor with Improved Oxygen Permeation

A porous perovskite BaCo_xFe_yZr_0.9?x?yPd_0.1O_3?δ (BCFZ‐Pd) coating was deposited onto the outer surface of a BaCo_xFe_yZr_1?x?yO_3?δ (BCFZ) perovskite hollow‐fiber membrane. The surface morphology of the modified BCFZ fiber was characterized by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), indicating the formation of a BCFZ‐Pd porous layer on the outer surface of a dense BCFZ hollow‐fiber membrane. The oxygen permeation flux of the BCFZ membrane with a BCFZ‐Pd porous layer increased 3.5 times more than that of the blank BCFZ membrane when feeding reactive CH₄ onto the permeation side of the membrane. The blank BCFZ membrane and surface‐modified BCFZ membrane were used as reactors to shift the equilibrium of thermal water dissociation for hydrogen production because they allow the selective removal of the produced oxygen from the water dissociation system. It was found that the hydrogen production rate increased from 0.7 to 2.1 mL H₂ min^?1 cm^?2 at 950 °C after depositing a BCFZ‐Pd porous layer onto the BCFZ membrane.