Studies on metabolism of total glucosides of paeony from Paeoniae Radix Alba in rats by UPLC‐Q‐TOF‐MS/MS

Total glucosides of paeony are the active constituents of Paeoniae Radix Alba. In this study, a novel strategy was proposed to find more metabolites and the differences between paeoniflorin, albiflorin and total glucosides of paeony (TGP). This strategy was characterized as follows: firstly, the animals were divided into three groups (paeoniflorin, albiflorin and TGP) to identify the source of TGP metabolites from paeoniflorin or albiflorin; secondly, a generic information‐dependent acquisition scan for the low‐level metabolites was triggered by the multiple mass defect filter and dynamic background subtraction; thirdly, the metabolites were identified with a combination of data‐processing methods including mass defect filtering, neutral loss filtering and product ion filtering; finally, a comparative study was used in the metabolism of paeoniflorin, albiflorin and TGP. Based on the strategy, 18 metabolites of TGP, 10 metabolites of paeoniflorin and 13 metabolites of albiflorin were identified respectively. The results indicated that the hydrolysis, conjugation reaction and oxidization were the major metabolic pathways, and the metabolic sites were the glycosidic linkage, the ester bond and the benzene ring. This study is first to explore the metabolism of TGP, and these findings enhance our understanding of the metabolism and the interactions of paeoniflrin and albiflorin in TGP. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Negative compressibility property in hinging open-cell Kelvin structure

A new three-dimensional(3 D) cellular model based on hinging open-cell Kelvin structure is proposed for its negative compressibility property. It is shown that this model has adjustable compressibility and does exhibit negative compressibility for some certain conformations. And further study shows that the images of compressibility are symmetrical about the certain lines, which indicates that the mechanical properties of the model in the three axial directions are interchangeable and the model itself has a certain geometric symmetry. A comparison of the Kelvin model with its anisotropic form with the dodecahedron model shows that the Kelvin model has stronger negative compressibility property in all three directions.Therefore, a new and potential method to improve negative compressibility property can be derived by selecting the system type with lower symmetry and increasing the number of geometric parameters.     

Recent trends in capillary and micro-chip electrophoretic instrumentation for field-analysis

Technical advances in the development of field-deployable capillary and microchip electrophoretic instruments and reports of their deployment between 2013 and 2017 were reviewed. Strategies and considerations in the design of the injection, separation and detection hardware, chemistry and associated infrastructure were discussed from an in-field perspective, with portability, robustness and automation/“ease of use” featuring as key requirements. Integration of functionality is important for adequate in-field performance. Progress was made towards the use of multiple channel devices for increased throughput and/or resolving power, mixing devices for on-line/in-line sample derivatization, battery operation and temperature control. The strengths and weaknesses of the various approaches described in the literature are discussed from the perspective of in-field operation. An overview of the applications of the field electrophoretic instruments is provided, including environmental science and planetary investigation.     

General Formation of Macro-/Mesoporous Nanoshells from Interfacial Assembly of Irregular Mesostructured Nanounits

Mesoporous core–shell nanostructures with controllable ultra-large open channels in their nanoshells are of great interest. However, soft template-directed cooperative assembly to mesoporous nanoshells with highly accessible pores larger than 30 nm, or even above 50 nm into macroporous range, remains a significant challenge. Herein we report a general approach for precisely tailored coating of hierarchically macro-/mesoporous polymer and carbon shells, possessing highly accessible radial channels with extremely wide pore size distribution from ca. 10 nm to ca. 200 nm, on diverse functional materials. This strategy creates opportunities to tailor the interfacial assembly of irregular mesostructured nanounits on core materials and generate various core–shell nanomaterials with controllable pore architectures. The obtained Fe,N-doped macro-/mesoporous carbon nanoshells show enhanced electrochemical performance for the oxygen reduction reaction in alkaline condition.     

Surface of Ru/Fe2O3 catalysts used in water-gas shift reaction studied by auger electron spectrometry

Summary Carbon deposits on the surface ofRu/Fe₂O₃ catalysts used in the water-gas shift reaction have been investigated by Auger Electron Spectrometry. A correlation has been found between the thickness of the carbon deposit and the catalytic activity in WGSR. The carbon deposit covers the metallic active centers and blocks their contact with reagents. The dotting of the iron oxide support with sodium has been found to reduce the amount of carbon deposit. .      

Optimality of the double exponential formula – functional analysis approach –

Summary. In the light of the functional analysis theory we establish the optimality of the double exponential formula. The argument consists of the following three ingredients: (1) introduction of a number of spaces of functions analytic in a strip region about the real axis, each space being characterized by the decay rate of their elements (functions) in the neighborhood of the infinity; (2) proof of the (near-) optimality of the trapezoidal formula in each space introduced in (1) by showing the (near-) equality between an upper estimate for the error norm of the trapezoidal formula and a lower estimate for the minimum error norm of quadratures; (3) nonexistence theorem for the spaces, the characterizing decay rate of which is more rapid than the double exponential. Received September 15, 1995 / Accepted December 14, 1995     

Phasenbeziehungen und Natriumionenleitung im quasi-binären System Na2SiF6/Na3AlF6

Phase Relations and Sodium Ion Conductivity within the Quasi-binary System Na₂SiF₆/Na₂AIF₆ . The phase diagram of the Na₂SiF₆/Na₃AlF₆ system has been determined by means of x-ray powder diffraction, thermal analysis and conductivity measurements in the sub-solidus region. Na₃AlF₆ accomodates up to 73 mol.-% Na₂SiF₆ maintaining the crystal structure type. The sodium ion conductivity increases by about five orders of magnitude upon doping Na₃AlF₆ with Na₂SiF₆.     

On the Moments of Overflow and Freed Carried Traffic for the GI/M/C/0 System

In circuit-switched networks call streams are characterized by their mean and peakedness (two-moment method). The GI/M/C/0 system is used to model a single link, where the GI-stream is determined by fitting moments appropriately. For the moments of the overflow traffic of a GI/M/C/0 system there are efficient numerical algorithms available. However, for the moments of the freed carried traffic, defined as the moments of a virtual link of infinite capacity to which the process of calls accepted by the link (carried arrival process) is virtually directed and where the virtual calls get fresh exponential i.i.d. holding times, only complex numerical algorithms are available. This is the reason why the concept of the freed carried traffic is not used. The main result of this paper is a numerically stable and efficient algorithm for computing the moments of freed carried traffic, in particular an explicit formula for its peakedness. This result offers a unified handling of both overflow and carried traffics in networks. Furthermore, some refined characteristics for the overflow and freed carried streams are derived.     

Reducing systems of linear differential equations to a passive form

In this paper, an application of the Riquer-Thomas-Janet theory is described for the problem of transforming a system of partial differential equations into a passive form, i.e., to a special form which contains explicitly both the equations of the initial system and all their nontrivial differential consequences. This special representation of a system markedly facilitates the subsequent integration of the corresponding differential equations. In this paper, the modern approach to the indicated problem is presented. This is the approach adopted in the Knuth-Bendix procedure [13] for critical-pair/completion and then Buchberger's algorithm for completion of polynomial ideal bases [13] (or, alternatively, for the construction of Groebner bases for ideals in a differential operator ring [14]). The algorithm of reduction to the passive form for linear system of partial differential equations and its implementation in the algorithmic language REFAL, as well as the capabilities of the corresponding program, are outlined. Examples illustrating the power and efficiency of the system are presented.