Nitrogen‐doped mesoporous carbon materials for oxidative dehydrogenation of propane

The CN‐15‐x series materials with different doses of SBA‐15 template and the CN‐y‐2.0 series materials with different hard templates were prepared by the hard template method with hexamethylenetetramine as the carbon and nitrogen source. The obtained mesoporous carbon materials were characterized by X‐ray diffraction (XRD), N₂ adsorption–desorption, transmission electron microscopy (TEM), Raman spectroscopy, and X‐ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS). The catalytic performance of propane oxidative dehydrogenation was determined. The characterization results indicate that the catalytic activity of CN‐15‐2.0 with a bipartite hexagonal ordered structure was higher than those of the other materials. The conversion of propane was 22.98%, and the selectivity toward propylene was 41.70%.     

Synthesis and specific influenza A virus‐adsorptive functionality of alkyl curdlan sulfate‐coated membrane filter

To develop a biomaterial with an influenza virus‐adsorptive functionality, an alkyl curdlan sulfate was prepared by ionic interaction between a positively charged didodecyldimethyl ammonium bromide and a negatively charged sulfate group of curdlan sulfate, which has potent anti‐HIV activity, and then it was coated on a membrane filter with a 1‐μm pore size by hydrophobic interaction with the long alkyl groups in the curdlan sulfate. The alkyl curdlan sulfate with the degree of alkylation (DOA) of 0.03 (one didodecyldimethyl group/12 sugar residues with 36 hydroxyl or sulfate groups) showed potent anti‐HIV activity in a 50% effective concentration (EC₅₀) as low as 0.87 μg/mL (standard curdlan sulfate EC₅₀ = 0.3 μg/mL), and the activity decreased with increasing DOA. A DOA higher than 0.1 (one didodecyldimethyl group/three sugar residues with nine hydroxyl or sulfate groups) gave no anti‐HIV activity. Although both curdlan sulfate and alkyl curdlan sulfates did not inhibited infection of Madin‐Darby canine kidney cells by influenza viruses, the alkyl curdlan sulfate‐coated membrane filter was found to have a specific adsorptive functionality for influenza A virus in vitro. When 1.6 mg of the alkyl curdlan sulfate with the DOA of 0.03 was coated on a membrane filter (φ13 mm; pore size, 1 μm), three stacked alkyl curdlan sulfate‐coated membrane filters dramatically decreased hemagglutination to 1/4–1/32. However, the membrane filter did not effectively remove on influenza B viruses, and thus a membrane filter without alkyl curdlan sulfate was not effective against influenza viruses. These results can therefore be presumed to demonstrate that the alkyl curdlan sulfate‐coated membrane filter removed influenza A viruses by adsorption between the negatively charged sulfate groups and the positively charged envelope protein of the virus. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Polym Sci Part A: Polym Chem, 2011