Quantification and cytotoxicity of degradation products (chloropropanols) in sucralose containing e-liquids with propylene glycol and glycerol as base.

Electronic cigarettes (e-cigarettes) have gained increasing popularity in recent years, mostly because they are supposed to be less harmful than regular cigarettes. Therefore, it is highly imperative to investigate possible noxious effects to protect the consumers. E-liquids consist of propylene glycol, glycerol, aroma compounds and sweeteners. One of these sweeteners is a chlorinated version of sucrose, namely sucralose. The aim of this work was to investigate degradation products of sucralose in the presence of propylene glycol and glycerol at different temperatures of commercially available e-cigarettes. Chemical analysis and biological tests were simultaneously performed on e-liquid aerosol condensates. The results of the chemical analysis, which was executed by employing GC-MS/GC-FID, demonstrated high amounts of various chloropropanols. The most abundant one is extremely toxic, namely 3-chloropropane-1,2-diol, which can be detected at concentrations ranging up to 10,000 mg/kg. Furthermore, a cytotoxicity investigation of the condensates was performed on HUVEC/Tert2 cells in which metabolic activity was determined by means of resazurin assay. The cellular metabolic activity significantly decreased by treatment with e-liquid aerosol condensate. Due to the results of this study, we advise against the use of sucralose as sweetener in e-liquids.

Is the Hexacyanoferrate(II) Anion Stable in Aqueous Solution? A Combined Theoretical and Experimental Study.

A combined theoretical and experimental study was performed to elucidate the structural and dynamical properties of the isolated aqueous hexacyanoferrate(II) ion as well as in the presence of potassium counterions. It is shown that in absence of counterions, the highly negatively charged hexacyanoferrate(II) complex is not stable in aqueous solution. However, if the high negative charge is compensated by potassium counterions, a stable complex is observed, which is proven by theoretical simulations as well as by extended X-ray absorption fine structure (EXAFS) experiments. From the simulation it is found that potassium ions surrounding the complex are highly mobile and thus cannot be observed via EXAFS experiments. The structure of aqueous hexacyanoferrate(II) in the presence of potassium ions is identical to that of the solid-state structure, but the mobility of potassium ions is significantly increased in the liquid. These highly mobile potassium ions circulating the complex are the reason for the very short lifetime of hydrogen bonds between solvent water molecules and cyanide ligands being on the femtosecond scale.

Ab initio quantum mechanical simulations confirm the formation of all postulated species in ionic dissociation.

A single sodium chloride molecule in aqueous solution was simulated by the ab initio quantum mechanical charge field-molecular dynamics (QMCF-MD) approach. During a series of simulations the solvated molecule (CIP), dissociated solvated ions and - most noticeably - a solvent separated ion pair (SSIP) were observed and the structural and dynamical characteristics of these systems were investigated. In addition to a detailed structural analysis of the observed species, vibrational spectra and charge distributions were calculated to elucidate the mechanism of the NaCl dissociation.

Lanthanide-IMAC enrichment of carbohydrates and polyols.

In this study a new type of immobilized metal ion affinity chromatography resin for the enrichment of carbohydrates and polyols was synthesized by radical polymerization reaction of vinyl phosphonic acid and 1,4-butandiole dimethacrylate using azo-bis-isobutyronitrile as radical initiator. Interaction between the chelated trivalent lanthanide ions and negatively charged hydroxyl groups of carbohydrates and polyols was observed by applying high pH values. The new method was evaluated by single standard solutions, mixtures of standards, honey and a more complex extract of Cynara scolymus. The washing step was accomplished by acetonitrile in excess volumes. Elution of enriched carbohydrates was successfully performed with deionized water. The subsequent analysis was carried out with matrix-free laser desorption/ionization-time of flight mass spectrometry involving a TiO2 -coated steel target, especially suitable for the measurement of low-molecular-weight substances. Quantitative analysis of the sugar alcohol xylitol as well as the determination of the maximal loading capacity was performed by gas chromatography in conjunction with mass spectrometric detection after chemical derivatization. In a parallel approach quantum mechanical geometry optimizations were performed in order to compare the coordination behavior of various trivalent lanthanide ions.

Largely reduced grid densities in a vibrational self-consistent field treatment do not significantly impact the resultingwavenumbers.

Especially for larger molecules relevant to life sciences, vibrational self-consistent field (VSCF) calculations can become unmanageably demanding even when only first and second order potential coupling terms are considered. This paper investigates to what extent the grid density of the VSCF's underlying potential energy surface can be reduced without sacrificing accuracy of the resulting wavenumbers. Including single-mode and pair contributions, a reduction to eight points per mode did not introduce a significant deviation but improved the computational efficiency by a factor of four. A mean unsigned deviation of 1.3% from the experiment could be maintained for the fifteen molecules under investigation and the approach was found to be applicable to rigid, semi-rigid and soft vibrational problems likewise. Deprotonated phosphoserine, stabilized by two intramolecular hydrogen bonds, was investigated as an exemplary application.

Isoleucine as a possible bridge between exogenous delivery and terrestrial enhancement of homochirality.

We report a highly enantioselective oligomerization of isoleucine stereomers in the salt-induced peptide formation reaction under plausibly prebiotic earth conditions. Up to 6.5-fold superiority in reactivity of L-isoleucine was observed, compared to its D-enantiomer, after 14 evaporation cycles in the presence of Cu(2+) and NaCl. Since isoleucine is among the proteinogenic amino acids that were found enantioenriched in meteorites, this present work may further correlate the extraterrestrial delivery and endogenous production of biological homochirality by virtue of a protein constituent rather than the rarely occurring α-methylated amino acids.

A new type of metal chelate affinity chromatography using trivalent lanthanide ions for phosphopeptide enrichment.

In this study, a new type of immobilized metal-ion affinity chromatography (IMAC) resin for the isolation of phosphopeptides was synthesized which is based on the specific interaction between phosphate groups and chelated lanthanide metal ions. In this regard trivalent lanthanum, holmium and erbium ions were chelated to a highly porous phosphonate polymer which was prepared by radical polymerization of vinylphosphonic acid (VPA) and divinylbenzene (DVB). The developed method was evaluated with peptide mixtures from digested standard proteins (α-casein, ß-casein and ovalbumin) as well as with bovine milk, egg white and a spiked HeLa cell lysate. Compared to the commonly used TiO2 approach, the presented method showed higher selectivity for phosphorylated peptides. This can be explained by the strong preference of trivalent lanthanide ions for phosphates with which they form very tight ionic bonds. Mono- and multiply phosphorylated peptides could be enriched and released in a single basic elution step, while non-phosphorylated peptides remained on the resin. Ab initio quantum mechanical energy minimizations of model complexes for polymer-ion-ligand interactions provided geometries, binding energies and charges which are discussed in conjunction with the observed experimental properties, leading to the most satisfying agreement. The presented lanthanide-IMAC resins represent promising affinity materials for the selective isolation of phosphopeptides from biological samples.

Dynamics of ligand exchange mechanism at Cu(II) in water: an ab initio quantum mechanical charge field molecular dynamics study with extended quantum mechanical region.

Ab initio quantum mechanical charge field molecular dynamics (QMCF-MD) were successfully applied to Cu(II) embedded in water to elucidate structure and to understand dynamics of ligand exchange mechanism. From the simulation studies, it was found that using an extended large quantum mechanical region including two shells of hydration is required for a better description of the dynamics of exchanging water molecules. The structural features characterized by radial distribution function, angular distribution function and other analytical parameters were consistent with experimental data. The major outcome of this study was the dynamics of exchange mechanism and reactions in the first hydration shell that could not be studied so far. The dynamical data such as mean residence time of the first shell water molecules and other relevant data from the simulations are close to the results determined experimentally. Another major characteristic of hydrated Cu(II) is the Jahn-Teller distortion which was also successfully reproduced, leading to the final conclusion that the dominating aqua complex is a 6-coordinated species. The ab initio QMCF-MD formalism proved again its capabilities of unraveling even ambiguous properties of hydrated species that are far difficult to explore by any conventional quantum mechanics/molecular mechanics (QM/MM) approach or experiment.

Chemical evolution from simple inorganic compounds to chiral peptides.

Numerous experiments performed in the past 50 years have strongly changed ideas of how life could have emerged on the primitive Earth. This review deals with the synthesis of biomolecule precursors under the conditions prevailing on the primordial Earth, and describes possible scenarios for their combination and elongation to form peptides and proteins. Furthermore it proposes different answers to one of the big secrets of nature: why DNA-coded biohomochiral life emerged using amino acids in their l-form?

A QMCF-MD investigation of the structure and dynamics of Ce4+ in aqueous solution.

A quantum-mechanical charge-field molecular dynamics simulation has been performed for a tetravalent Ce ion in aqueous solution. In this framework, the complete first and second hydration spheres are treated by ab initio quantum mechanics supplemented by an electrostatic embedding technique, making the construction of non-Coulombic solute-solvent potentials unnecessary. During the 10 ps of simulation time, the structural aspects of the solution were analyzed by various methods. Experimental results such as the mean Ce-O bond distance and the predicted first-shell coordination number were compared to the results obtained from the simulation resolving some ambiguities in the literature. The dynamics of the system were characterized by mean ligand residence times and frequency/force constant calculations. Furthermore, Ce-O and Ce-H angular radial distribution plots were employed, yielding deeper insight into the structural and dynamical aspects of the system.

Guanidinium in aqueous solution studied by quantum mechanical charge field-molecular dynamics (QMCF-MD).

Structure and dynamics of guanidinium in aqueous solution were examined via a double zeta HF level Quantum Mechanical Charge Field-Molecular Dynamics (QMCF-MD) simulation, as well as two Molecular Mechanics-Molecular Dynamics (MM-MD) simulations, parametrised via the Amber99 parameter set, employing the side chain of arginine as a template. Coulombic parameters were fitted via Mulliken population data of the QM simulation, as well as via the recommended restrained electrostatic potential fit (RESP). Although guanidinium is one of the most weakly hydrated cations yet characterised, its hydration pattern is quite complex and pronounced in the quantum mechanical simulation. The positive charge is mainly located on the central carbon, resulting in strong solute-oxygen coordination. Hydrogen bonds are mainly donated by the amide hydrogens, but are also accepted via the nitrogens to a very low extent. Detailed analysis of structure and dynamics, comparing the applied QM and MM models, provides evidence that the arginine parametrisation leads to highly different results than the quantum mechanical treatment, and that the RESP parametrisation is too polarised.

Hydration of trivalent lanthanum revisited - An ab initio QMCF-MD approach.

The previously investigated La3+-hydrate has been re-evaluated by means of the quantum mechanical charge field (QMCF) molecular dynamics (MD) approach. Improved description of the hydration characteristics has been realised by including the full second hydration shell into the quantum mechanically treated region and by introducing the influence of the surrounding bulk via an electrostatic embedding technique. Analytical tools such as the ligand angular radial distribution analysis have been employed to gain deeper insight into the structural features of the hydrate. La3+ simultaneously forms nona- and decahydrates with capped trigonal and quadratic prismatic structure, besides small amounts of an octahydrate.

Computational study of the cerium(III) ion in aqueous environment.

This work comprises the first quantum chemical simulation study of the Ce3+ ion in aqueous environment. The structural and dynamical properties have been investigated by means of the quantum mechanical charge field (QMCF) molecular dynamics (MD) approach and the results, where applicable, have been compared to experimental data. Besides conventional analytical tools, angular radial distribution functions have been employed to gain deeper insight into the structure of the hydrate. The ion-oxygen stretching motion's wavenumber, further characterising the Ce-O bond, is in excellent agreement with experimental results, same as the structural values obtained from the simulation.

Structure and dynamics of methanol in water: a quantum mechanical charge field molecular dynamics study.

An ab initio quantum mechanical charge field molecular dynamics simulation was carried out for one methanol molecule in water to analyze the structure and dynamics of hydrophobic and hydrophilic groups. It is found that water molecules around the methyl group form a cage-like structure whereas the hydroxyl group acts as both hydrogen bond donor and acceptor, thus forming several hydrogen bonds with water molecules. The dynamic analyses correlate well with the structural data, evaluated by means of radial distribution functions, angular distribution functions, and coordination number distributions. The overall ligand mean residence time, τ identifies the methanol molecule as structure maker. The relative dynamics data of hydrogen bonds between hydroxyl of methanol and water molecules prove the existence of both strong and weak hydrogen bonds. The results obtained from the simulation are in excellent agreement with the experimental results for dilute solution of CH(3)OH in water. The overall hydration shell of methanol consists in average of 18 water molecules out of which three are hydrogen bonded.

Sulfur dioxide in water: structure and dynamics studied by an ab initio quantum mechanical charge field molecular dynamics simulation.

An ab initio Quantum Mechanical Charge Field Molecular Dynamics Simulation (QMCF MD) was performed to investigate structure and dynamics behavior of hydrated sulfur dioxide (SO(2)) at the Hartree-Fock level of theory employing Dunning DZP basis sets for solute and solvent molecules. The intramolecular structural characteristics of SO(2), such as S═O bond lengths and O═S═O bond angle, are in good agreement with the data available from a number of different experiments. The structural features of the hydrated SO(2) were primarily evaluated in the form of S-O(wat) and O(SO(2))-H(wat) radial distribution functions (RDFs) which gave mean distances of 2.9 and 2.2 Å, respectively. The dynamical behavior characterizes the solute molecule to have structure making properties in aqueous solution or water aerosols, where the hydrated SO(2) can easily get oxidized to form a number of sulfur(VI) species, which are believed to play an important role in the atmospheric processes.

Selective adsorption and chiral amplification of amino acids in vermiculite clay-implications for the origin of biochirality.

Smectite clays are hydrated layer silicates that, like micas, occur naturally in abundance. Importantly, they have readily modifiable interlayer spaces that provide excellent sites for nanochemistry. Vermiculite is one such smectite clay and in the presence of small chain-length alkyl-NH(3)Cl ions forms sensitive, 1-D ordered model clay systems with expandable nano-pore inter-layer regions. These inter-layers readily adsorb organic molecules. n-Propyl NH(3)Cl vermiculite clay gels were used to determine the adsorption of alanine, lysine and histidine by chiral HPLC. The results show that during reaction with fresh vermiculite interlayers, significant chiral enrichment of either L- and D-enantiomers occurs depending on the amino acid. Chiral enrichment of the supernatant solutions is up to about 1% per pass. In contrast, addition to clay interlayers already reacted with amino acid solutions resulted in little or no change in D/L ratio during the time of the experiment. Adsorption of small amounts of amphiphilic organic molecules in clay inter-layers is known to produce Layer-by-Layer or Langmuir-Blodgett films. Moreover atomistic simulations show that self-organization of organic species in clay interlayers is important. These non-centrosymmetric, chirally active nanofilms may cause clays to act subsequently as chiral amplifiers, concentrating organic material from dilute solution and having different adsorption energetics for D- and L-enantiomers. The additional role of clays in RNA oligomerization already postulated by Ferris and others, together with the need for the organization of amphiphilic molecules and lipids noted by Szostak and others, suggests that such chiral separation by clays in lagoonal environments at normal biological temperatures might also have played a significant role in the origin of biochirality.

Hydrogen bond formation of formamide and N-methylformamide in aqueous solution studied by quantum mechanical charge field-molecular dynamics (QMCF-MD).

The formation of hydrogen-bonds of formamide and "cis"-N-methylformamide in aqueous solution was examined using double zeta HF level Quantum Mechanical Charge Field-Molecular Dynamics (QMCF-MD) simulations. Basic attributes such as structure and dynamics of the solvates and hydrogen-bonds were studied in particular by means of coordination number distributions, mean residence times and radial distribution functions, on which spatial restrictions in the form of planes and cones were applied. Advanced methods of analysis gave detailed information about the sterical environment and the dynamic behavior of strong and weak hydrogen-bonds formed by the residues. The comparison of both molecules over a sampling period of 12 ps provided information on the influence of methylation of the amide function on molecular and hydration properties.

Structure and dynamics of the Zr(4+) ion in water.

The four-times positively charged zirconium ion in aqueous solution was simulated, using an ab initio quantum mechanical charge field molecular dynamics approach. As no hydrolysis reaction occurred during the simulation time of 10 ps, the target of this study was the evaluation of the structure and dynamics of the monomeric hydrated zirconium(iv) ion. The ion forms three hydration shells. In the first hydration shell the ion is 8-fold coordinated with a maximum probability of the Zr-O distance at 2.25 Å. While no exchanges occurred between the first and second shell, the mean residence time of the water molecules in the second shell is 5.5 ps. A geometry of the first hydration shell in-between a bi-capped trigonal prism and a square antiprism was found and a Zr-O force constant of 188 N m(-1) was evaluated.

Hydration of highly charged ions.

Based on a series of ab initio quantum mechanical charge field molecular dynamics (QMCF MD) simulations, the broad spectrum of structural and dynamical properties of hydrates of trivalent and tetravalent ions is presented, ranging from extreme inertness to immediate hydrolysis. Main group and transition metal ions representative for different parts of the periodic system are treated, as are 2 threefold negatively charged anions. The results show that simple predictions of the properties of the hydrates appear impossible and that an accurate quantum mechanical simulation in cooperation with sophisticated experimental investigations seems the only way to obtain conclusive results.

An ab initio quantum mechanical charge field molecular dynamics simulation of a dilute aqueous HCl solution.

An ab initio quantum mechanical charge field (QMCF) molecular dynamics simulation has been performed to study the structural and dynamical properties of a dilute aqueous HCl solution. The solute molecule HCl and its surrounding water molecules were treated at Hartree-Fock level in conjunction with Dunning double-zeta plus polarization function basis sets. The simulation predicts an average H-Cl bond distance of 1.28 A, which is in good agreement with the experimental value. The H(HCl)...O(w) and Cl(HCl)...H(w) distances of 1.84 and 3.51 A were found for the first hydration shell. At the hydrogen site of HCl, a single water molecule is the most preferred coordination, whereas an average coordination number of 12 water molecules of the full first shell was observed for the chloride site. The hydrogen bonding at the hydrogen site of HCl is weakened by proton transfer reactions and an associated lability of ligand binding. Two proton transfer processes were observed in the QMCF MD simulation, demonstrating acid dissociation of HCl. A weak structure-making/breaking effect of HCl in water is recognized from the mean residence times of 2.1 and 0.8 ps for ligands in the neighborhood of Cl and H sites of HCl, respectively.