Zwitterionic materials with disorder and plasticity and their application as non-volatile solid or liquid electrolytes.

Zwitterionic materials can exhibit unique characteristics and are highly tunable by variation to the covalently bound cationic and anionic moieties. Despite the breadth of properties and potential uses reported to date, for electrolyte applications they have thus far primarily been used as additives or for making polymer gels. However, zwitterions offer intriguing promise as electrolyte matrix materials that are non-volatile and charged but non-migrating.

Characterization of a series of far-red-absorbing thiobarbituric acid oxonol derivatives as fluorescent probes for biological applications.

Chromophores that absorb in the far-red region of the spectrum are increasingly being utilized for applications in the biosciences. We have synthesized and evaluated a novel series of fluorescent oxonols based on thiobarbituric acids containing aryl and heteroaryl substituents. The novel chromophores possess narrow absorption spectra ( approximately 40-nm bandwidths), reasonable Stokes shifts ( approximately 25 nm), and quantum yields of up to 0.