Metal-free cucurbit[7]uril (CB7) solid-state assemblies promote acid-catalysed alcoholysis of aliphatic and aromatic epoxides under mild conditions to give β-alkoxy alcohols, which are important intermediates for the synthesis of a vast range of compounds such as bioactive pharmaceuticals. The catalytic process is heterogeneous and the catalyst can be reused in consecutive runs without any reac...

Despite the high stability of bulk water, water microdroplets possess strikingly different properties, such as presence hydroxyl radicals (OH?) at air–water interface. Previous studies exhibited recombination OH? into H2O2 molecules and capture by oxidizing other molecules. By spraying pure a mass spectrometer, we detected in form (H4O2)+ that is essentially OH??H3O+, radical combined with hydr...

In the United States, high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS) has become a sucrose replacement for honey bees and has widespread use as a sweetener in many processed foods and beverages for human consumption. It is utilized by commercial beekeepers as a food for honey bees for several reasons: to promote brood production, after bees have been moved for commercial pollination, and when field-gathered ne...

T4 phage lysozyme is an inverting glycoside hydrolase that degrades the murein of bacterial cell walls by cleaving the β-1,4-glycosidic bond. The substitution of the catalytic Thr26 residue to a histidine converts the wild type from an inverting to a retaining enzyme, which implies that the original general acid Glu11 can also act as an acid/base catalyst in the hydrolysis. Here, we have determ...

The hydrolysis oF seven ethyl substituted phenylbenzaldehyde acetals, () CR = C2H5, X = H), has been examined in details ; the catalytic constants of six buffer acids (pKa ranging -From 2.6 to 8) as well as those of hydronium ion and water have been measured. A good Brnsted correlation is obtained for all compounds, the a coefficient decreasing regularly from 0.7 to 0.5 when the basicity of the...

Proton solvation and proton mobility are both subjects of great interest in chemistry and biology. Here we have studied the hydration shells of H3O+ at temperatures ranging from 260 to 340 K using the multistate empirical valence-bond methodology (MS-EVB2). We have calculated the radial distribution functions for the protonium and its solvation shells. Furthermore, we have determined the Gibbs ...