Harmonious K-I-O Co-modification of g-C3N4 for Improved Charge Separation and Photocatalysis

Co-modification of graphitic carbon nitride (g-C3N4) photocatalysts can maximally optimize its intrinsic photoelectric structures, but usually involve complex multistep reactions, thus is challenging because the structural collapse and active sites...

Simplified, Shear Induced Generation of Double Emulsions for Robust Compartmentalization during Single Genome Analysis

Drop microfluidics has driven innovations for high throughput, low input analysis techniques such as single-cell RNA-seq. However, the instability of single emulsion (SE) drops occasionally causes significant merging during drop processing, limiting most applications to single-step reactions in drops. Here, we show that double emulsion (DE) drops address this critical limitation and completely prevent content mixing, which is essential for single entity analysis. DEs show excellent stability during thermal cycling. More importantly, DEs undergo rupture into the continuous phase instead of merging, preventing content mixing and eliminating unstable drops from the downstream analysis. Due to the lack of drop merging, the monodispersity of drops is maintained throughout a workflow, enabling the deterministic manipulation of drops downstream. We also developed a simple, one-layer fabrication method for DE drop makers. This design is powerful as it allows robust production of single-core DEs at a wide range of flow rates and better control over the shell thickness, both of which have been significant limitations of conventional two-layer devices. This approach makes the fabrication of DE devices much more accessible, facilitating its broader adoption. Finally, we show that DE droplets effectively maintain the compartmentalization of single virus genomes during PCR-based amplification and barcoding, while SEs mixed contents due to merging. With their resistance to content mixing, DE drops have key advantages for multistep reactions in drops, which is limited in SEs due to merging and content mixing.

Evaluating the Simple Arrhenius Equation for the Temperature Dependence of Complex Developmental Processes

SummaryThe famous Arrhenius equation is well motivated to describe the temperature dependence of chemical reactions but has also been used for complicated biological processes. Here, we evaluate how well the simple Arrhenius equation predicts complex multistep biological processes, using frog and fruit fly embryogenesis as two canonical models. We find the Arrhenius equation provides a good approximation for the temperature dependence of embryogenesis, even though individual developmental stages scale differently with temperature. At low and high temperatures, however, we observed significant departures from idealized Arrhenius Law behavior. When we model multistep reactions of idealized chemical networks we are unable to generate comparable deviations from linearity. In contrast, we find the single enzyme GAPDH shows non-linearity in the Arrhenius plot similar to our observations of embryonic development. Thus, we find that complex embryonic development can be well approximated by the simple Arrhenius Law and propose that the observed departure from this law results primarily from non-idealized individual steps rather than the complexity of the system.

A requirement for an active proton delivery network supports a compound I-mediated C–C bond cleavage in CYP51 catalysis

CYP51 enzymes (sterol 14α-demethylases) are cytochromes P450 that catalyze multistep reactions. The CYP51 reaction occurs in all biological kingdoms and is essential in sterol biosynthesis. It removes the 14α-methyl group from cyclized sterol precursors by first forming an alcohol, then an aldehyde, and finally eliminating formic acid with the introduction of a Δ14–15 double bond in the sterol core. The first two steps are typical hydroxylations, mediated by an electrophilic compound I mechanism. The third step, C–C bond cleavage, has been proposed to involve either compound I (i.e. FeO3+) or, alternatively, a proton transfer-independent nucleophilic ferric peroxo anion (compound 0, i.e. Fe3+O2–). Here, using comparative crystallographic and biochemical analyses of WT human CYP51 (CYP51A1) and its D231A/H314A mutant, whose proton delivery network is destroyed (as evidenced in a 1.98-Å X-ray structure in complex with lanosterol), we demonstrate that deformylation of the 14α-carboxaldehyde intermediate requires an active proton relay network to drive the catalysis. These results indicate a unified, compound I-based mechanism for all three steps of the CYP51 reaction, as previously established for CYP11A1 and CYP19A1. We anticipate that our approach can be applied to mechanistic studies of other P450s that catalyze multistep reactions, such as C–C bond cleavage.

Apparent Activation Energy in Electrochemical Multistep Reactions: A Description via Degrees of Rate Control

<div> <div> <div> <p>Activation energy is a well-known empirical parameter in chemical kinetics that characterises the dependence of the chemical rate coefficients on the temperature and provides information to compare the intrinsic activity of the catalysts. However, the determination and interpretation of the apparent activation energy in multistep reactions is not an easy task. For this purpose, the concept of degree of rate control is convenient, which comprises a mathematical approach for analyzing reaction mechanisms and chemical kinetics. Although this concept has been used in catalysis, it has not yet been applied in electrocatalytic systems, whose ability to control the potential across the solid/liquid interface is the main difference with heterogenous catalysis, and the electrical current is commonly used as a measure of the reaction rate. Herein we use the definition of ‘degree of rate control for elementary step’ to address some of the drawbacks that frequently arise with interpreting apparent activation energy as a measure of intrinsic electrocatalytic activity of electrode. For this, an electrokinetic model Langmuir-Hinshelwood-like is used for making numerical experiments and verifying the proposed ideas. The results show that to improve the catalytic activity of an electrode material, it must act upon the reaction steps with the highest normalised absolute values of degree of rate control. On the other hand, experiments at different applied voltages showed that if the electroactive surface poisoning process take place, changes in 𝐸𝑎𝑝𝑝 can not be used to compare the catalytic activity of the electrodes. Finally, the importance of making measurements at steady-state to avoid large errors in the calculations of apparent activation energy is also discussed. </p> </div> </div> </div>

Apparent Activation Energy in Electrochemical Multistep Reactions: A Description via Degrees of Rate Control

<div> <div> <div> <p>Activation energy is a well-known empirical parameter in chemical kinetics that characterises the dependence of the chemical rate coefficients on the temperature and provides information to compare the intrinsic activity of the catalysts. However, the determination and interpretation of the apparent activation energy in multistep reactions is not an easy task. For this purpose, the concept of degree of rate control is convenient, which comprises a mathematical approach for analyzing reaction mechanisms and chemical kinetics. Although this concept has been used in catalysis, it has not yet been applied in electrocatalytic systems, whose ability to control the potential across the solid/liquid interface is the main difference with heterogenous catalysis, and the electrical current is commonly used as a measure of the reaction rate. Herein we use the definition of ‘degree of rate control for elementary step’ to address some of the drawbacks that frequently arise with interpreting apparent activation energy as a measure of intrinsic electrocatalytic activity of electrode. For this, an electrokinetic model Langmuir-Hinshelwood-like is used for making numerical experiments and verifying the proposed ideas. The results show that to improve the catalytic activity of an electrode material, it must act upon the reaction steps with the highest normalised absolute values of degree of rate control. On the other hand, experiments at different applied voltages showed that if the electroactive surface poisoning process take place, changes in 𝐸𝑎𝑝𝑝 can not be used to compare the catalytic activity of the electrodes. Finally, the importance of making measurements at steady-state to avoid large errors in the calculations of apparent activation energy is also discussed. </p> </div> </div> </div>