Catalytic asymmetric alkylation of α-cyanocarboxylates and acetoacetates using a phase-transfer catalyst

The catalytic asymmetric alkylation of α-cyanocarboxylates and acetoacetates with an alkyl halide was performed under phase-transfer conditions to afford compounds which have a chiral quaternary carbon with up to 97% and 94% ee, respectively. As applications of this method, chiral 2-oxindole derivatives and a β-lactam derivative were synthesized.     

Photoluminescence intermittency in single CdSe nanoparticles: Environment dependence

We report that photoluminescence (PL) intermittency properties of single CdSe semiconductor nanoparticles at room temperature are sensitive to local environments around nanoparticles. The PL intermittency behaviors depend on ambient gas (N₂ or air) and substrate material (glass or Au). Blueshift of the PL peak energy is observed on glass and Au surfaces during photodegradation in air. The mechanism of the PL intermittency of single CdSe nanoparticles is discussed.     

Observation of charged excitons in hole-doped carbon nanotubes using photoluminescence and absorption spectroscopy

We report the first observation of trions (charged excitons), three-particle bound states consisting of one electron and two holes, in hole-doped carbon nanotubes at room temperature. When p-type dopants are added to carbon nanotube solutions, the photoluminescence and absorption peaks of the trions appear far below the E11 bright exciton peak, regardless of the dopant species. The unexpectedly large energy separation between the bright excitons and the trions is attributed to the strong electron-hole exchange interaction in carbon nanotubes.     

Catalytic asymmetric allylation of 3,4-dihydroisoquinolines and its application to the synthesis of isoquinoline alkaloids

A catalytic asymmetric allylation of 3,4-dihydroisoquinoline was carried out with allyltrimethoxylsilane-Cu as the nucleophile in the presence of DTBM-SEGPHOS as the chiral ligand to afford corresponding chiral 1-allyltetrahydroisoquinoline derivatives in good yield and stereoselectivity. The allyl adduct thus obtained was applied to the synthesis of several isoquinoline alkaloids such as crispine A and homolaudanosine. The reaction was further used for the synthesis of the isoquinoline moiety of schulzeine A.     

On some slowly convergent series involving the Hurwitz zeta-function

We shall extract the essence of the Adamchik–Srivastava generating function method (Analysis (Munich) 18 (1998) 131) by proving the most far-reaching Ramanujan–Yoshimoto formula and by showing that some of the results stated in Srivastava and Choi (Series Associated with the Zeta and Related Functions, Kluwer Academic Publishers, Dordrecht, 2001) are simple consequences of the above-mentioned formula.     

On a conjecture of S. Chowla and of S. Chowla and H. Walum,II

In 1965, Chowla and Walum conjectured that, $\text{G}{}_{\mathrm{a,k}}\text{(x):=}\text{Σ}{}_{\mathrm{n\; \le \; \surd x}}\text{n}{}^{\mathrm{a}}\text{P}{}_{\mathrm{k}}\text{(}\text{x}\text{n}\text{) = O(x}{}^{\mathrm{<mtext>a</mtext><mtext>2</mtext><mtext>\; +\; </mtext><mtext>1</mtext><mtext>4</mtext><mtext>\; +\; \epsilon </mtext>}}\text{)}$ holds for each ε > 0 and x → ∞, where integers a ≥ 0 and k ≥ 1 are given and P_k is the periodic Bernoulli function of order k. Recently, the authors established this conjecture in case k ≥ 2 and $\text{a >}\text{1}\text{2}$ with ε = 0 while if $\text{a =}\text{1}\text{2}$, with a log factor. In this paper, it is proven that the conjecture, in case $\text{|a| <}\text{1}\text{2}$, k = 2, is true “on average”.