Rose bengal as photocatalyst: visible light-mediated Friedel-Crafts alkylation of indoles with nitroalkenes in water.

A novel and facile visible-light-mediated alkylation of indoles and nitroalkenes has been developed. In this protocol, rose bengal acts as a photosensitizer, and environmentally benign water was used as the green and efficient reaction medium. Indoles reacted smoothly with nitroalkenes under the irradiation of visible-light and generated corresponding 3-(2-nitroalkyl)indoles in moderate to good yields (up to 87%).

Enantioselective photooxygenation of β-dicarbonyl compounds in batch and flow photomicroreactors.

A series of C-2' modified cinchonine-derived phase-transfer catalysts were synthesized and used in the enantioselective photo-organocatalytic aerobic oxidation of β-dicarbonyl compounds with excellent yields (up to 97%) and high enantioselectivities (up to 90% ee). Furthermore, the reaction was carried out in a flow photomicroreactor, in which the heterogeneous gas-liquid-liquid asymmetric photocatalytic oxidation reaction was performed affording good yields (up to 97%) and enantioselectivities (up to 86% ee) within 0.89 min.

Analyzing S-adenosylhomocysteine hydrolase gene sequences in deuterostome genomes.

S-adenosylhomocysteine hydrolase (SAHH) gene sequences of sea-urchin, two amphioxus, sea-squirt and eight vertebrates are comparatively analyzed in the current analysis. Although SAHH protein sequences are highly conserved in these species, their nucleotide sequences are much different, ranging from 5,446 bp in amphioxus to 40,174 bp in zebra fish. The length divergence is mainly caused by distinct introns in some species.