Surface plasmon resonance (SPR) is a novel optical sensing technique with a unique ability to monitor molecular binding in real-time for biological and chemical sensor applications. Interferometry is an excellent tool for accurate measurement of SPR changes, the measurement and comparison is made for the sensitivity, dynamic range and resolution of the different analytes using interferometry techniques. SPR interferometry can also employ phase detection in addition to the amplitude of the reflected light wave, and the phase changes more rapidly compared with other approaches, i.e., intensity, angle and wavelength. Therefore, the SPR phase interferometer offers the advantages of spatial phase resolution and high sensitivity. This work discusses the advancements in interferometric SPR methods to measure the phase shifts due to refractive index changes. The main application areas of SPR sensors are demonstrated, i.e., the Fabry-Perot interferometer, Michelson interferometer and Mach-Zehnder interferometer, with different configurations. The three interferometers are discussed in detail, and solutions are suggested to enhance the performance parameters that will aid in future biological and chemical sensors.
Drug discovery is a highly complicated, tedious and potentially rewarding approach associated with great risk. Pharmaceutical companies literally spend millions of dollars to produce a single successful drug. The drug discovery process also need strict compliance to the directions on manufacturing and testing of new drug standards before their release into market. All these regulations created the necessity to develop advanced approaches in drug discovery. The contributions of advanced technologies including high resolution analytical instruments, 3-D biological printing, next-generation sequencing and bioinformatics have made positive impact on drug discovery & development. Fortunately, all these advanced technologies are evolving at the right time when new issues are rising in drug development process. In the present review, we have discussed the role of genomics and advanced analytical techniques in drug discovery. Further, we have also discussed the significant advances in drug discovery as case studies.
Radiotracer experiments are carried out in order to determine the mean residence time (MRT) as well as percentage of dead zone, V dead (%), in an integrated mixer consisting of Rushton and pitched blade turbine (PBT). Conventionally, optimization was performed by varying one parameter and others were held constant (OFAT) which lead to enormous number of experiments. Thus, in this study, a 4-factor 3-level Taguchi L9 orthogonal array was introduced to obtain an accurate optimization of mixing efficiency with minimal number of experiments. This paper describes the optimal conditions of four process parameters, namely, impeller speed, impeller clearance, type of impeller, and sampling time, in obtaining MRT and V dead (%) using radiotracer experiments. The optimum conditions for the experiments were 100 rpm impeller speed, 50 mm impeller clearance, Type A mixer, and 900 s sampling time to reach optimization.
Combined computational and experimental strategies for the systematic design of chemical sensor arrays using carbonitrile neutral receptors are presented. Binding energies of acetonitrile, n-pentylcarbonitrile and malononitrile with Ca(II), Mg(II), Be(II) and H⁺ have been investigated with the B3LYP, G3, CBS-QB3, G4 and MQZVP methods, showing a general trend H⁺ > Be(II) > Mg(II) > Ca(II). Hydrogen bonding, donor-acceptor and cation-lone pair electron simple models were employed in evaluating the performance of computational methods. Mg(II) is bound to acetonitrile in water by 12.5 kcal/mol, and in the gas phase the receptor is more strongly bound by 33.3 kcal/mol to Mg(II) compared to Ca(II). Interaction of bound cations with carbonitrile reduces the energies of the MOs involved in the proposed σ-p conjugated network. The planar malononitrile-Be(II) complex possibly involves a π-network with a cationic methylene carbon. Fabricated potentiometric chemical sensors show distinct signal patterns that can be exploited in sensor array applications.
A CD-modified micellar EKC (CD-MEKC) method with 2-hydroxypropyl-gamma-CD (HP-gamma-CD) as chiral selector for the enantioseparation of three chiral triazole fungicides, namely hexaconazole, penconazole, and myclobutanil, is reported for the first time. Simultaneous enantioseparation of the three triazole fungicides was successfully achieved using a CD-MEKC system containing 40 mM HP-gamma-CD and 50 mM SDS in 25 mM phosphate buffer (pH 3.0) solution with resolutions (R(s)) greater than 1.60, peak efficiencies (N) greater than 200,000 for all enantiomers and an analysis time within 15 min compared to 36 min as previously reported using sulfated-beta-CD.
Thermally assisted hydrolysis and methylation-gas chromatography (THM-GC) in the presence of an organic alkali was validated for the compositional analysis of poly(3-hydroxybutyrate-co-3-hydroxyhexanoate) [P(3HB-co-3HHx)] accumulated in whole bacterial cells. Recombinant Cupriavidus necator Re2058/pCB113 was grown in a batch fermentation with different concentration of palm oil and fructose in order to control the molar fraction of 3HHx in P(3HB-co-3HHx) produced in the cells. Trace amounts (30μg) of freeze-dried cells were directly subjected to THM-GC in the presence of tetramethylammonium hydroxide (TMAH) at 400°C. The obtained chromatograms clearly showed nine characteristic peaks, attributed to the THM products from 3HB and 3HHx units in the polymer chains, without any appreciable interference by the bacterial matrix components. Based on these peak intensities, the copolymer compositions were determined rapidly without using any cumbersome and lengthy sample pretreatment as in conventional GC method. Moreover, the compositions thus obtained were strongly correlated with those by NMR and conventional GC involving solvent extraction.
The influence of optical parameters, additional techniques (e.g. PIDS technology) and the importance of light microscopy were investigated by comparing laser diffraction data obtained via the conventional method and an optimized analysis method. Also the influence of a possible dissolution of nanocrystals during a measurement on the size result obtained was assessed in this study. The results reveal that dissolution occurs if unsaturated medium or microparticle saturated medium is used for the measurements. The dissolution is erratic and the results are not reproducible. Dissolution can be overcome by saturating the measuring medium prior to the measurement. If nanocrystals are analysed the dispersion medium should be saturated with the nanocrystals, because the solubility is higher than for coarse micro-sized drug material. The importance of using the optimized analysis method was proven by analysing 40 different nanosuspensions via the conventional versus the optimized sizing method. There was no large difference in the results obtained for the 40 nanosuspensions using the conventional method. This would have led to the conclusion, that all the 40 formulations investigated are physically stable. However, the analysis via the optimized method revealed that from 40 formulations investigated only four were physically stable. In conclusion an optimized analysis saves time and money and avoids misleading developments, because discrimination between "stable" and "unstable" can be done reliably at a very early stage of the development.