A short and efficient synthesis of (+)-disparlure and its enantiomer

A short and highly efficient approach was applied for the total synthesis of the gypsy moth sex pheromone (+)-disparlure and its enantiomer from isopropylidene D- and L-erythrose, using a common strategy.     

A mathematical theory of gravitational collapse

We study the asymptotic behaviour, as the retarded timeu tends to infinity, of the solutions of Einstein's equations in the spherically symmetric case with a massless scalar field as the material model. We prove that when the final Bondi massM ₁ is different from zero, asu , a black hole forms of massM ₁ surrounded by vacuum. We find the rate of decay of the metric functions and the behaviour of the scalar field on the horizon.Research supported in part by National Science Foundation grants MCS-8201599 to the Courant Institute and PHY-8318350 to Syracuse University     

Synthesis of N-acyl-2-pyrrolidinones from the corresponding N-acyl-GABA derivatives

In this work, the synthesis of 1-(pyridine-3-carbonyl)pyrrolidin-2-one ( 1a ) and 1-(2-propyl-1-pentanoyl)pyrrolidin-2-one ( 1b ) by cyclization of the corresponding GABA derivatives, is reported. Two different methods are developed. For the synthesis of 1a , the parent molecule 4-[(pyridine-3-carbonyl)-amino]butanoic acid ( 2a ) is treated first with thionyl chloride and then with triethylamine. The second derivative, 1b , is produced by an intramolecular dehydration of 4-(2-propylpentanoylamino)butanoic acid ( 2b ) using an acid catalyst.     

Structure and ultrafast dynamics of liquid water: a quantum mechanics/molecular mechanics molecular dynamics simulations study

A quantum mechanics/molecular mechanics molecular dynamics simulation was performed for liquid water to investigate structural and dynamical properties of this peculiar liquid. The most important region containing a central reference molecule and all nearest surrounding molecules (first coordination shell) was treated by Hartree-Fock (HF), post-Hartree-Fock [second-order Moller-Plesset perturbation theory (MP2)], and hybrid density functional B3LYP [Becke's three parameter functional (B3) with the correlation functional of Lee, Yang, and Parr (LYP)] methods. In addition, another HF-level simulation (2HF) included the full second coordination shell. Site to site interactions between oxygen-oxygen, oxygen-hydrogen, and hydrogen-hydrogen atoms of all ab initio methods were compared to experimental data. The absence of a second peak and the appearance of a shoulder instead in the gO-O graph obtained from the 2HF simulation is notable, as this feature has been observed so far only for pressurized or heated water. Dynamical data show that the 2HF procedure compensates some of the deficiency of the HF one-shell simulation, reducing the difference between correlated (MP2) and HF results. B3LYP apparently leads to too rigid structures and thus to an artificial slow down of the dynamics.     

Reactions of furazano[3,4-b]quinoxalines with phosphorus ylides and an unusual oxidative transformation of the transylidation product

Reactions of furazano[3,4-b]quinoxalines 1 with phosphorus ylides 2 afford the transylidation product 3 and/or 4,9-dihydrofurazano[3,4-b]quinoxalines 4. Oxidation of 3 with phenyliodide bis-trifluoroacetate gave the fused furan derivative 13 in high yield.     

CORTICOSTEROID (METHYLPREDNISOLONE) MODULATION OF PHOTOPEROXIDATION BY ULTRAVIOLET LIGHT IN LIPOSOMES

Abstract— UV irradiation of ovolecithin liposomes produced a dose dependent wave of peroxidation which reached a peak and then fell again coincident with substrate exhaustion. This correlated well with subsequent increases in membrane permeability. There was a progressive loss of unsaturated fatty acids, and when cholesterol was incorporated into liposomes, the UV produced a progressive loss of this steroid.
Methylprednisolone sodium succinate, a synthetic corticosteroid, was found to inhibit this peroxidation in a dose dependent manner, also ameliorating membrane permeability increases when present during irradiation, but not able to compensate for pre-existing damage. When cholesterol was present in the liposomes, methylprednisolone sodium succinate was also able to protect this steroid from UV peroxidative damage.
The rates of reaction in this system suggested that polyunsaturated fatty acids, even when present in extremely small concentrations, underwent an initial rapid wave of peroxidation, which served to initiate the slower rate of lipoperoxidation within the bulk of mono- and di-"unsaturates". At low concentrations, the corticosteroid preferentially blocked damage to mono- and di-unsaturated fatty acids, affecting the polyunsaturated fatty acids as well, at higher concentrations.
This study suggests that the corticosteroid, methylprednisolone sodium succinate, possesses antioxidant properties in lipid systems subjected to free radical peroxidation.     

Gravitational radiation recoil on anN-body system

The main purpose of this paper is to present a formula of gravitational radiation recoil of an N-body material system.     

Grating-mediated waveguiding

We propose a method of optical waveguiding, which relies on Bragg diffractions from a 1D grating that gives rise to waveguiding in the direction normal to the grating wave vector. The waveguide structure consists of a shallow 1D grating that has a bell- or trough-shaped amplitude in the confinement direction. Finally, we provide an experimental proof of the concept for this mechanism.     

Stable soliton complexes in two-dimensional photonic lattices

We show that two-dimensional photonic Kerr nonlinear lattices can support stable soliton complexes composed of several solitons packed together with appropriately engineered phases. This may open up new prospects for encoding pixellike images made of robust discrete or lattice solitons.