Corn stover fractions and bioenergy

Information is presented on structure, composition, and response to enzymes of corn stover related to barriers for bioconversion to ethanol. Aromatic compounds occurred in most tissue cell walls. Ferulic acid esterase treatment before cellulase treatment significantly improved dry weight loss and release of phenolic acids and sugars in most fractions over cellulase alone. Leaf fractions were considerably higher in dry weight loss and released sugars with esterase treatment, but stem pith cells gave up the most phenolic acids. Results help identify plant fractions more appropriate for coproducts and bioconversion and those more suitable as residues for soil erosion control.     

Asymptotic analysis of a large closed queueing network with discriminatory processor sharing

In this paper the steady-state behavior of a closed queueing network with multiple classes and large populations is investigated. One of the two nodes of the network simply introduces random delays and the discipline in the other node is discriminatory processor sharing. The network is not product-form, so not even the steady-state behavior is known. We assume that the usage is moderately heavy, and obtain two-term asymptotic approximations to the mean number of jobs, and the mean sojourn time, of each class of jobs in the processor node. We also obtain the leading term in the asymptotic approximation to the joint distribution of the number of jobs in the processor node, which is a zero-mean multivariate Gaussian distribution around a line through the origin.     

Properties of polystyrene-poly(methylmethacrylate) random and diblock copolymers in dilute and semidilute solutions

Solution properties for random and diblock copolymers of polystyrene (PS) and poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) have been measured by dynamic and total intensity light scattering in solvents of differing quality. The results are compared with the corresponding properties for PS and PMMA homopolymers of similar molecular weight, in order to determine if interactions between unlike monomers are significant. The hydrodynamic radius (R_h) and diffusion second virial coefficient (k_d) for the random copolymer are found to be larger than the corresponding values for the homopolymers in a solvent which is near-theta for the two homopolymers, whereas no such effect is observed for the block copolymer. This suggests that most intrachain interactions occur a relatively short distance along the chain backbone. In a mutual good solvent R_h and k_d of the random copolymer are comparable to the average of the values for the homopolymers, indicating that in a good solvent monomer/solvent interactions dominate over monomer/monomer interactions. For an isolated diblock copolymer in a mutual good solvent, there is no evidence that interactions between unlike monomers lead to additional expansion of the entire molecule, as measured by R_h, nor expansion of the individual blocks as probed by light scattering with one block optically masked. However, at low but finite concentration there is evidence (the coefficients of the binary interaction terms in the viscosity and the mutual diffusion coefficient, and the second and third virial coefficients) that a weak ordering effect may exist in block copolymer solutions, far from the conditions where microphase separation occurs. Finally, measurements of ternary polymer-polymer-solvent solutions show no dependence on monomer composition or monomer distribution for the tracer diffusion of probe PS-PMMA copolymers in a PMMA/toluene matrix. This indicate that the frictional interaction is largely unaffected by interactions between unlike monomers. However, there is evidence that the thermodynamic interaction is more unfavorable between a random copolymer and the homopolymer matrix than between a diblock and the matrix. © 1994 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

Bundles, Handcuffs, and Local Freedom

We answer a question of J. Anderson's by producing infinitely many commensurability classes of fibered hyperbolic 3-manifolds whose fundamental groups contain subgroups that are locally free and not free. These manifolds are obtained by performing 0–surgery on a collection of knots with the same properties.     

Formation, isolation and characterization of an AB-biaryl atropisomer of oritavancin

Oritavancin is a semi-synthetic glycopeptide antibiotic which is structurally related to vancomycin. When oritavancin bisphosphate is dried in vacuo with heat, a new compound forms. This new compound is stable only in the solid state and reverts to oritavancin in solution. Highly enriched samples of this compound were obtained by preparative HPLC and the structure of this compound was elucidated by using one and two-dimensional (¹H and ¹³C) NMR spectroscopy in conjunction with computer-assisted molecular modeling. It has been determined that oritavancin adopts a conformation similar to that of vancomycin in solution, while the new compound is the unnatural R-AB-biaryl atropisomer of oritavancin. This is the first observation and isolation of an AB-biaryl atropisomer in an intact member of the vancomycin family of glycopeptide antibiotics.     

Chemical imaging in biology and medicine using ion microscopy

The ability to quantitatively map the distribution of elements on the micrometer scale and smaller with high sensitivity and isotopic discrimination is unique to ion microscopy. The information contained in ion images can be crucial to the study of the solid state, where chemical heterogeneity is often directly related to observed behavior. The tools of digital image processing allow the extraction of quantitative information from the image data. These techniques coupled with improved instrumentation for the detection of ion images drastically increase the problem solving capabilities of the ion microscope. The use of such methods and instrumentation in the ion microscopic analyses of cell cultures and tissues of biological and biomedical relevance will be discussed.