Humic substances are a heterogeneous class of moderate molecular weight, yellow-colored biomolecules present in all soils, sediments, and natural waters. Although humic substances are generally resistant to microbial degradation under anaerobic conditions, some microorganisms in soils and sediments can use quinone moieties in humic substances as electron acceptors. Laboratory experiments have s...

Through a synergetic combination of anion photoelectron spectroscopy and density functional theory based calculations, we have investigated the extent to which the aluminum moieties within selected magnesium-aluminum clusters are Zintl anions. Magnesium-aluminum cluster anions were generated in a pulsed arc discharge source. After mass selection, photoelectron spectra of MgmAln (-) (m, n = 1,6;...

The thermally induced volume phase transition process of poly(N-isopropylacrylamide-co-acrylic acid) (PNIPAM-co-AA) hydrogel is studied using FT-IR spectroscopy in combination with the perturbation correlation moving window (PCMW) technique and two-dimensional correlation spectroscopy (2Dcos) analysis. According to PCMW spectra analysis, an elevation of volume phase transition temperature (VPTT...

N-heterocyclic moieties are abundant among pharmaceuticals and agrochemicals, but a challenge for metalorganic organocatalytic transformations. We present tripeptides of the type H-Pro-Pro-Xaa as catalysts stereoselective conjugate addition reactions between substituted aldehydes electrophiles. Alkyl substituents at N-terminal proline, reactive site, were crucial high chemo- stereoselectivity. ...

We designed and studied hydrocarbon model compounds by high-resolution noncontact atomic force microscopy. In addition to planar polycyclic aromatic moieties, these novel model compounds feature linear alkyl and cycloaliphatic motifs that exist in most hydrocarbon resources - particularly in petroleum asphaltenes and other petroleum fractions - or in lipids in biological samples. We demonstrate...

Described are amphiphilic polymers that are provided with chelating moieties. The amphiphilic polymers are block copolymers comprising a hydrophilic block and a hydropho bic block, with the chelating moieties linked to the end-group of the hydrophilic block. The disclosed polymers are capable of self-assembly into structures Such as micelles and poly mersomes. With suitable metals present in th...