We report molecular dynamics simulations of the equilibrium folding/unfolding thermodynamics of the RNA tetraloop in explicit solvent. A replica exchange molecular dynamics study of the r(CGUUGCCG) oligomer that forms a hairpin is performed for 226 ns per replica, using 52 replicas. We are able to show the unbiased folding of all replicas starting from extended conformations. The equilibrium pr...

The deoxyoligonucleotide 5' AATCGGGCATGGATT (15-mer) was synthesized containing 12 phosphoramidate linkages derived from 2 primary and 2 secondary amines. The oligonucleotides were purified by reverse phase HPLC and characterized by PAGE. The thermal stability of the duplexes derived from these compounds, when hybridized to the complementary diester linked oligomer, were determined and compared...

The size, shape and distribution of different phases in thermoplastic polyolefin (TPO) blends and composites are critical to the properties of the materials, but can be difficult to characterise. Here we report the combination of heavy metal staining and focused ion beam - scanning electron microscopy (FIB-SEM) to reveal the three-dimensional (3D) structure of an elastomer-modified poly(propyle...

A cluster anion of vinyl compounds in the gaseous phase has served as one of the simplest microscopic models of the initial stages of anionic polymerization. Herein, we describe our investigations into the initial stage mechanisms of anionic polymerization of acrylonitrile (AN; CH2═CHCN) trimer anions. While the cyclic oligomer is found in mass and photoelectron spectroscopic studies of (AN)3(-...

Living systems produce copies of information-carrying molecules such as DNA by assembling monomer units into finite-length oligomer (short polymer) copies. We explore the role initiation and termination copy process in thermodynamics copying. By splitting free-energy change formation informational chemical terms, we show that accuracy plays no direct overall thermodynamics. Instead, it is therm...

The homogeneous non-catalytic hydrogenation of cis-1,4 poly(isoprene), isotactic cis-1,4 poly(1,3-pentadiene) and syndiotactic cis-1,4 poly(1,3-pentadiene) with diimide, formed by thermal decomposition of para-toluenesulfonylhydrazide, is examined. Perfectly alternating ethylene/propylene copolymers having different tacticity (i.e., isotactic and syndiotactic), which are difficult to synthesize...

Four new chiral polymers of BINOLSalen-cobalt ACHTUNGTRENNUNG(III) salt complexes have been designed, synthesized and applied to the direct fabrication of chiral propylene carbonate from racemic propylene oxide. The (R/S)-polymer catalyst 2 and (S/R)-polymer catalyst 4 exhibit better enantioselectivity than the (R/R)-polymer catalyst 1 and the (S/S)-polymer catalyst 3 and have been recovered an...

Soluble beta-amyloid (Aβ) oligomer is believed to be the most important toxic species in the brain of Alzheimer's disease (AD) patients. Thus, it is critical to develop a simple method for the selective detection of Aβ oligomer with low cost and high sensitivity. In this paper, we report an electrochemical method for the detection of Aβ oligomer with a peptide as the bioreceptor and silver nano...