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Full-Text Articles in Physical Sciences and Mathematics

Characterization Of An Amine-Thiol Cosolvent System : Ethylenediamine And Mercaptoethanol, Fernanda Giongo Fernandes Dec 2022

Characterization Of An Amine-Thiol Cosolvent System : Ethylenediamine And Mercaptoethanol, Fernanda Giongo Fernandes

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Since its introduction, the amine-thiol cosolvent system has been successfully utilized for the deposition of various thin-film devices, but its mechanism of action is still uncertain. Herein, we have attempted to dissect some of the chemical characteristics of amine-thiol cosolvents, with a special interest taken towards a mixture of ethylenediamine (en) and mercaptoethanol (ME). Conductivity was measured for multiple amine-thiol combinations at different ratios to determine extent of ionization in solution, with en-ME having one of the highest solution conductivities. Exposing the solution to air for several days was found to decrease the conductivity of en-ME, indicating the formation of …


Turning Density Functional Theory Calculations Into Molecular Mechanics Simulations : Establishing The Fluctuating Density Model For Rna Nucleobases, Christopher A. Myers Dec 2022

Turning Density Functional Theory Calculations Into Molecular Mechanics Simulations : Establishing The Fluctuating Density Model For Rna Nucleobases, Christopher A. Myers

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Molecular mechanics (MD) simulations and density functional theory (DFT) have been the backbone of computational chemistry for decades. Due to its accuracy and computational feasibility, DFT has become the go-to method for theoretically predicting interaction energies, polarizability, and other electronic properties of small molecules at the quantum mechanical level. Although less fundamental than DFT, molecular mechanics (MM) algorithms have been just as influential in the fields of biology and chemistry, owing their success to the ability to compute measurable, macroscopic quantities for systems with tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands of atoms at a time. Nevertheless, MD simulations would …


Soil From Footwear Is A Newly Rediscovered Type Of Forensic Evidence Due To The Application Of Modern Analytical Techniques : A Review, Rhilynn Haley Ogilvie Dec 2022

Soil From Footwear Is A Newly Rediscovered Type Of Forensic Evidence Due To The Application Of Modern Analytical Techniques : A Review, Rhilynn Haley Ogilvie

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Traces of soil discovered on a footwear were historically among the first types of evidence used by crime scene investigators. This type of evidence has been rediscovered recently due to the application of powerful analytical techniques providing quantitative characteristics of the soil (bio)chemical composition. Advanced statistical analysis of the quantitative data further improves the probative value of the soil evidence. The article overview main aspects of the emerging techniques for the forensic soil analysis and the factors that challenge data interpretation including mixing, contamination, and composition complexity. Overcoming these issues is crucial for utilizing soil analysis for forensic purposes.


An Ims-Ms/Md Workflow For Determining Higher Order Structure And Dynamics Of Nucleic Acids, Rebecca D'Esposito Aug 2022

An Ims-Ms/Md Workflow For Determining Higher Order Structure And Dynamics Of Nucleic Acids, Rebecca D'Esposito

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Ion mobility spectrometry - mass spectrometry (IMS-MS) has potential for the investigation of structure and dynamics in large biopolymers, which will come to full fruition only with a firmer understanding of how to interpret the experimental data. Numerous studies have employed elements of nucleic acid (NA) secondary structure, such as duplexes and hairpins, to explore the relationships between structure, experimental conditions, and actual observations. When combined with molecular dynamics simulations (MDS), IMS-MS can be effectively employed to perform structural elucidation of biomolecules that are not readily amenable to established techniques employed for structural analysis.


Amyloid Fibril Formation And Polymorphism : A Critical Role Of Sulfur-Containing Amino Acid Residues, Tatiana Quiñones-Ruiz Aug 2022

Amyloid Fibril Formation And Polymorphism : A Critical Role Of Sulfur-Containing Amino Acid Residues, Tatiana Quiñones-Ruiz

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Protein aggregation that results in the formation of amyloid fibrils has been linked to many neurodegenerative disorders, including Alzheimer’s disease and Parkinson’s disease. The sulfur atoms in methionine (Met) and cysteine (Cys) residues of proteins can be readily oxidized, significantly affecting their properties. Oxidation of sulfur-containing amino acids has recently been shown to affect protein fibrillation. This work presents novel findings on Cys and Met redox reactions that are related to the formation of amyloid fibrils and on the polymorphism of a model fibrillogenic protein, hen egg white lysozyme (HEWL). Biophysical techniques including Raman spectroscopy, atomic force microscopy, electron paramagnetic …


Probing The Stability And Solution Processability Of Metal Chalcogenide Semiconducting Materials, Mengwen Yan Jul 2022

Probing The Stability And Solution Processability Of Metal Chalcogenide Semiconducting Materials, Mengwen Yan

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Metal chalcogenide (MCh) semiconductors have long research history due to their earth abundance, easy synthesizability, and accessible band gap tunability. People have realized their functionality as p-type semiconductors that provide good hole mobility and conductivity within the materials. However, MChs have easier reaction pathway with gas molecules (H2O and O2) compared to other semiconductors such as metal oxides. Also, poor solution processability of all MChs make low-cost thin film fabrication methods hard to achieve. In this thesis, we target to understand both the chemical stability and solution processability of MCh materials. ZnSe based inorganic organic layered hybrids (LHs) were exfoliated …


Raman Spectroscopy Of Aged Waterlogged Bones: Protocol Optimization, Bailey Hoplight May 2022

Raman Spectroscopy Of Aged Waterlogged Bones: Protocol Optimization, Bailey Hoplight

Chemistry

Current methods used for determining the age buried bones for forensic purposes are heavily affected by environmental conditions, can be susceptible to scientific bias and the interpretation can vary from investigator to investigator. Raman Spectroscopy can potentially be used as an automatic method to analyze the composition of bone eliminating the human factor. To test this hypothesis, we will use Raman spectroscopy to potentially identify the burial time of bones. The change in the chemical composition of the pig bones was probed using a Raman spectrometer with a 785nm excitation wavelength. Other parameters of the Raman instrument were optimized to …


Hierarchical Modelling Of Raman Spectroscopic Data Demonstrates The Potential For Manufacturer And Caliber Differentiation Of Smokeless Powders, Nathan Russell Bartlett May 2022

Hierarchical Modelling Of Raman Spectroscopic Data Demonstrates The Potential For Manufacturer And Caliber Differentiation Of Smokeless Powders, Nathan Russell Bartlett

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

With the rise of gun-based crime and the advent of lead-free ammunition reducing the effectiveness of previously used methods, the analysis of smokeless powders to better understand organic gunshot residues is now more important than ever. One method that has shown potential is Raman spectroscopy, a relatively quick, nondestructive, and non-contact analysis method. To investigate whether Raman spectroscopy could be used to characterize individual powders, samples of smokeless powders from three manufacturers, Remington, Federal, and Winchester, each with two 9mm caliber and two .38 caliber ammo types, were dissolved, and their Raman spectra were collected. A hierarchical modelling system was …


Long-Term Trends And Variability Of Pm₂.₅ Mass, Chemical Components, And Sources Over Nys, Hesham Abdelmonem Hassan May 2022

Long-Term Trends And Variability Of Pm₂.₅ Mass, Chemical Components, And Sources Over Nys, Hesham Abdelmonem Hassan

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Eighteen years of ambient PM2.5 mass and major components are used in this study to harmonize the carbonaceous fraction of PM2.5 data, and to examine long-term trends and seasonal variability changes. The major decreasing trend of PM2.5 mass and major inorganic ions reflects the ambient concentration response to clean air regulations and policies.Although elemental carbon shows a decreasing trend in agreement with most other PM2.5 components, organic carbon shows a different behavior of no-trend to slightly increasing trend in some sites. Organic carbon behavior indicates the growing role of non-combustion sources at the expense of decreasing combustion sources. Seasonal trends …


An Entropic Approach To Dynamics, Pedro Henrique Moreira Pessoa May 2022

An Entropic Approach To Dynamics, Pedro Henrique Moreira Pessoa

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

The present thesis deals with different aspects of probability, the method of maximum entropy, information geometry, and dynamical systems and their applications to statistical physics and complex systems. Those topics come together in the framework for dynamics termed entropic dynamics. Work on the topic was initiated by my PhD advisor Professor Ariel Caticha and many colleagues at University at Albany as a method for explaining the dynamical processes in quantum mechanics from first principles of probability theory.


Fluorescent Labelling Of Ribosomal Rna In Live Mammalian Cells, Amir Agharezaee Jan 2022

Fluorescent Labelling Of Ribosomal Rna In Live Mammalian Cells, Amir Agharezaee

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

This thesis describes a bio-orthogonal chemistry-based approach for new methods of fluorescence labelling of RNA in live HeLa cells via an IEDDA reaction of TCO with tetrazine. The key step of the approach is synthesis of two nucleobase analogues which were modified with TCO and a masked 5′-phosphate group using aryl phosphonamidite chemistry. Synthesis of tubercidin and uridine analogues were considered in this investigation for incorporation into RNA in live HeLa cells. Synthetic approach was successful at installing the handle containing TCO to tubercidin and uridine to make compounds 12 and 21 respectively (the synthesis of both of which are …


Discrimination Between Human And Non-Human Blood Using Raman Spectroscopy And A Self-Reference Algorithm For Forensic Purposes : Method Expansion And Validation, Harrison Dickler Jan 2022

Discrimination Between Human And Non-Human Blood Using Raman Spectroscopy And A Self-Reference Algorithm For Forensic Purposes : Method Expansion And Validation, Harrison Dickler

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Determining whether the origin of a bloodstain is human or non-human is an important capability of a forensic investigation. In their pioneering work, Bian et al. (Journal of biomedical optics, 2017) introduced a self-reference peak algorithm for the analysis of bloodstain Raman spectra and demonstrated a great potential of this approach for differentiating human and nonhuman blood. However, this work only used three non-human species in the creation of their model. This study investigates the capability of a self-referencing peak algorithm to discriminate between human and 18 non-human species based on the Raman spectra of blood samples. The intensity ratios …


Methodology Studies For Dearomatized Dimer And Beta-Lactone-Mediated Native Chemical Ligation In Organic Synthesis, Xinhao Fan Jan 2022

Methodology Studies For Dearomatized Dimer And Beta-Lactone-Mediated Native Chemical Ligation In Organic Synthesis, Xinhao Fan

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Chapter 1: Dimers of naphthalenol derivatives were synthesized by photocatalysis, cobalt(II) acetylacetonate. Several functional groups were tolerant of its skeleton. This novel dimer was connected through a reversible sigma bond. Its reversibility was confirmed by chiral HPLC and 1H-NMR experiments. Through EPR and Stern-Volmer quenching experiments, we proposed the reaction mechanism. The reversibility property can be potentially beneficial in polymers, self-healing, and memory materials.Chapter 2: We report an epimerization-free native chemical ligation reaction by β-lactone-mediated peptides. This approach can achieve Thr-Xaa efficiently and rapidly. Besides, it has a broad side-chain tolerance. Through the competition reaction experiment, it was demonstrated that …


Synthesis Of Oligonucleotides Containing Unnatural Backbone And Regulation Of Crispr Activity Using Inverse Electron Demand Diels-Alder Chemistry, Alyssa Hoy Jan 2022

Synthesis Of Oligonucleotides Containing Unnatural Backbone And Regulation Of Crispr Activity Using Inverse Electron Demand Diels-Alder Chemistry, Alyssa Hoy

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

This thesis describes the synthesis of an oligonucleotide containing an unnatural neutralbackbone. The backbone was constructed using bio-orthogonal inverse electron demand Diels- Alder chemistry between trans-cyclooctene (TCO) and tetrazine (Tz). A TCO phosphoramidite was synthesized and attached to solid support for strand propagation. Uridine monomers containing either bis-TCO or bis-Tz were also synthesized. The oligonucleotide strand was formed by sequential ligation of the bis-Tz and bis-TCO monomers. The oligonucleotide was analyzed using mass spectrometry. This thesis also describes the synthesis of sgRNAs containing non-canonical nucleobases, m1A, m6A, s2U and s4U using the ‘split-and-click’ methodology. The synthetic sgRNAs were assembled using …


Development And Applications Of Touch Chemistry Biometrics Analysis Of Latent Fingermarks By Maldi-Ms, Cameron M. Longo Jan 2022

Development And Applications Of Touch Chemistry Biometrics Analysis Of Latent Fingermarks By Maldi-Ms, Cameron M. Longo

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Fingerprint evidence has long been a pillar of forensic science and has been used for over a century as a means of identifying an individual. This is accomplished through the comparison of friction ridge patterns, which are inherently unique to each individual, and the practice of visualizing fingerprints and comparing them has become a well-studied field. While these techniques have been optimized and improved over time, they generally rely only on the physical pattern to provide information about the donor, and not the content of the fingerprint material itself. In the modern era, steps have been made to extract from …


First Homoleptic Rare Rarth Metal Complexes With Doubly-Reduced Dibenzocyclooctatetraene, James C. Mahoney Jan 2022

First Homoleptic Rare Rarth Metal Complexes With Doubly-Reduced Dibenzocyclooctatetraene, James C. Mahoney

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

A set of novel complexes of rare earth elements, M(III) = Y, La, Gd, Tb, and Dy, with the doubly-reduced dibenzo[a,e]cyclooctatetraene (DBCOT) anion has been synthesized and crystallographically characterized for the first time. Preparation of new complexes has been accomplished through the ligand-metathesis reaction of M(III) triiodides with K2(DBCOT) in THF at ambient conditions. Subsequent crystallization via slow solvent evaporation afforded single crystals of good quality. X-ray diffraction technique confirmed that all complexes are isomorphous and conform to the [M(DBCOT)(THF)4][M(DBCOT)2] composition. In their crystal structures, the monoanionic double-decker sandwiches, [M(DBCOT)2], weakly interact with the cationic counterparts, [M(DBCOT)(THF)4]+. In both parts, …


Uio-Type Metal-Organic Framework Derivatives As Sorbents For The Detection Of Gas-Phase Explosives, Matthew Ryan Sherrill Jan 2022

Uio-Type Metal-Organic Framework Derivatives As Sorbents For The Detection Of Gas-Phase Explosives, Matthew Ryan Sherrill

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

The detection of energetic compounds – better known to the public as explosives – has is an important cornerstone of counterterrorism and homeland security . While significant advances have been achieved for the detection of trace explosives in various matrices such as soil, wastewater, and clothing, the detection of explosives in the gas phase remains challenging due to their infamously low vapor pressures. In this thesis, we leverage the high sensitivity of direct analysis in real-time mass spectrometry (DART-MS) and the microporosity of metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) to adsorb and therefore concentrate explosives from the vapor phase and subsequently detect them …


Photopolymers : Environmentally Benign Technology For A Variety Of Industries, Tatyana Tarasevich Jan 2022

Photopolymers : Environmentally Benign Technology For A Variety Of Industries, Tatyana Tarasevich

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Photopolymerization is a well-known process with applications in a variety of industries. Photopolymers are formed by a reaction of monomers or oligomers, photoinitiators and in some cases crosslinkers. Upon irradiation with UV or visible light, monomers undergo conformational change to form polymers via a photochemical process. Several photopolymerization types will be discussed in this thesis. End products of photopolymerizations included epoxies, inks, coatings, photoresists, etc.