Structural varieties of selectively mixed G- and C-rich short DNA sequences studied with electrospray ionization mass spectrometry.

Short guanine(G)-repeat and cytosine(C)-repeat DNA strands can self-assemble to form four-stranded G-quadruplexes and i-motifs, respectively. Herein, G-rich and C-rich strands with non-G or non-C terminal bases and different lengths of G- or C-repeats are mixed selectively in pH 4.5 and 6.

A novel anti-VEGF targeting and MRI-visible smart drug delivery system for specific diagnosis and therapy of liver cancer.

A pH-responsive anticancer drug polymer conjugate p(aspartate)-graft-p(ethylene glycol)-dodecylamine-hydrazone-(adriamycin-levulinic acid) is synthesized as a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)-visible and pH-sensitive drug delivery system. Being pH-sensitive, the anticancer drug ADR are stable in the polymeric micelles at neutral pH, resembling the physiological environment, whereas they release rapidly in acidic endosomal/lysosomal compartments of tumor cells for cancer therapy with the acid-linker breaking. For the purporse of MR imaging, the hydrophobic superparamagnetic iron oxide nanoparticles are encapsulated inside the core of the micelles.

Solvent-free synthesis of zeolites from solid raw materials.

As important industrial materials, microporous zeolites are necessarily synthesized in the presence of solvents such as in hydrothermal, solvothermal, and ionothermal routes. We demonstrate here a simple and generalized solvent-free route for synthesizing various types of zeolites by mixing, grinding, and heating solid raw materials. Compared with conventional hydrothermal route, the avoidance of solvents in the synthesis not only significantly reduces the waste production, but also greatly increases the yield of zeolite products.

Designed copper-amine complex as an efficient template for one-pot synthesis of Cu-SSZ-13 zeolite with excellent activity for selective catalytic reduction of NOx by NH3.

Low-cost copper-amine complex was rationally designed to be a novel template for one-pot synthesis of Cu-SSZ-13 zeolites. Proper confirmation and appropriate size make this complex fit well with CHA cages as an efficient template. The products exhibit superior catalytic performance on NH(3)-SCR reaction.

UV-Raman and NMR spectroscopic studies on the crystallization of zeolite A and a new synthetic route.

UV-Raman and NMR spectroscopy, combined with other techniques, have been used to characterize crystallization of zeolite A. In situ UV-Raman spectroscopy shows that the starting gel for crystallization of zeolite A contains a lot of four-ring (4R) building units and the appearance of six-ring (6R) building blocks is the signal for crystal formation. (29)Si NMR spectroscopy results suggest that the starting gel is double four-ring (D4R) rich and during crystallization of zeolite A both α and β cages appear.

Investigation on the chain-to-chain and chain-to-open-framework transformations of two one-dimensional aluminophosphate chains.

Using ethylenediamine as a template, two one-dimensional (1-D) aluminophosphate compounds [AlP(2)O(8)H][NH(3)CH(2)CH(2)NH(3)] (1) and [AlP(2)O(8)][NH(3)CH(2)CH(2)NH(3)][NH(4)] (2) have been prepared from a gel system: 1.0:x:y:44 Al(i-PrO)(3)-H(3)PO(4)-en-EG (x = 3.0-9.