Nitrile functionalized methimazole-based ionic liquids

The alkylation reaction of 2-mercapto-1-methylimidazole 1b with 2-chloroacetonitrile and 2-chloropropionitrile produced S-alkyl methimazole chlorides 2a and 2b which were subjected to anion metathesis with lithium bis(trifluoromethanesulfonyl)amide, LiNTf(2), to afford nitrile functionalized methimazole-based room temperature ionic liquids 3a and 3b in 94% and 89% yields, respectively. Ionic liquids 3a and 3b have reasonably wide electrochemical windows. The efficient extraction of Ag(+) from aqueous media into 3a and 3b is also reported.     

17O and 14N spectroscopy of 17O-labeled nucleic acid bases

Oxygen-17 and nitrogen-14 nuclear magnetic resonance techniques have been utilized in studying liquid-state hydrogen bonding interactions between nucleic acid bases and between the bases and solvent. The bases uracil and thymine have been labeled with ¹⁷O at positions 2 and 4, cytosine at position 2 and thymine riboside at position 4. The ¹⁷O chemical shift was found to be a sensitive structural probe and to provide information concerning the resonance forms that contribute to the total wave function. The chemical shift of the oxygen of thymine and uracil at position 2 was detected at a higher field than that of oxygen at position 4, presumably owing to an increased contribution of single bonded-oxygen valence bond structures at position 2. The ¹⁷O and ¹⁴N chemical shifts of cytosine were found to be strongly pH dependent, and the results have been interpreted in terms of predominant cytosine resonance structures contributing to the aqueous cation and anion. The ¹⁷O line width of cytosine in aqueous solution indicates the presence of hydrogen bonded dimers between neutral and cationic forms.     

The effects of molecular orientation on the physical aging and mobility of polycarbonate—solid state NMR and dynamic mechanical analysis

Solid‐state NMR and dynamic mechanical (DMA) measurements were performed on a series of uniaxially hot‐drawn bisphenol‐A polycarbonate samples in order to determine the effects of stretching on the structure, mobility, and local orientation environment. Proton spin‐lattice relaxation times, ¹H T_1ρ, for the phenylene carbon protons were fitted to a biexponential decay function, and both the long and short relaxation times initially increased with stretching. Intensity data indicated an increase in the number of short relaxation time protons and a decrease in the number of long relaxation protons with orientation. Similarly, DMA spectra showed that the β‐relaxation strength also increased with drawing, which implied an increase in the number of localized segmental relaxations. It is theorized that the long and short ¹H T_1ρ relate to protons within tightly packed “cooperative domains,” and to those with greater localized free‐volume, respectively. Stretching is known to distort the free‐volume distribution, causing a decrease in the mean free‐volume but an increase in the number of larger, more elliptical holes. This is expected to cause a decrease in the α‐transition mobility (due to larger cooperative domains) and an increase in the β‐mobility (due to the increase in the number of β‐relaxing segments associated with the larger free‐volume holes). These predictions are consistent with results recently reported by Shelby and Wilkes on the physical aging and creep behavior of these samples (M. D. Shelby & G. L. Wilkes, Polymer 1998, 39, 6767; M. D. Shelby & G. L. Wilkes, J Polym Sci Part B: Polym Phys 1998, 36, 2111). © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. J Polym Sci B: Polym Phys 39: 32–46, 2001     

13C NMR study of the structural phase transition in C10H21NH3Cl

The temperature dependence of the order parameter for the rotational motion of the alkyl chains between two equilibrium orientations separated by 90° has been measured by ¹³C NMR in C₁₀H₂₁NH₃Cl. The results show that the onset of rotations together with a partial melting of the chains makes the effective chain diameter eventually larger than half the low temperature lattice distance thus driving the transitions from an intercalated to a non-intercalated structure.     

On the order of the phase transition in KDA type ferroelectric crystals

The observation of a thermal hysteresis indicates that the phase transitions in KDA, KD²A, RDA and CDA crystals are of the first order. The static dielectric properties of these ferroelectrics resemble those of KD²P.