The orthophosphate host family, A(I)B(II)PO(4) (A(I) = monovalent cation, B(II) = divalent cation), has recently been made available as phosphors that combine with near-UV lighting chips for use in solid-state white light-emitting diodes (LEDs). This study elucidates the crystalline structure and lattice parameters of the products via a solid-state reaction, using powder X-ray diffraction (XRD)...

A combined procedure for separating Lu, Hf, Sm, Nd, and rare earth elements (REEs) from a single sample digest is presented. The procedure consists of the following five steps: (1) sample dissolution via sodium peroxide sintering; (2) separation of the high field strength elements from the REEs and other matrix elements by a HF-free anion-exchange column procedure; (3) purification of Hf on a c...

In ancient Greece, "terra sigillata" or "sealed earth" was reputed to be a successful counter agent for poisons (1). Its fame grew through the centuries commensurately with the refined custom of poisoning one's dinner partner. Early trials of the effectiveness of "terra sigillata" are reported in two 16th century documents (2). The first, dated 1580, records that of eight dogs who were fed vari...

The major facilitator superfamily (MFS) is one of the two largest families of membrane transporters found on Earth. It is present ubiquitously in bacteria, archaea, and eukarya and includes members that can function by solute uniport, solute/cation symport, solute/cation antiport and/or solute/solute antiport with inwardly and/or outwardly directed polarity. All homologous MFS protein sequences...

Copper ATPases, in analogy with other members of the P-ATPase superfamily, contain a catalytic headpiece including an aspartate residue reacting with ATP to form a phosphoenzyme intermediate, and transmembrane helices containing cation-binding sites [TMBS (transmembrane metal-binding sites)] for catalytic activation and cation translocation. Following phosphoenzyme formation by utilization of A...

As an earth-abundant p-type semiconductor, copper sulfide (Cu2S) is an attractive material for application in photovoltaic devices. However, it suffers from a minority carrier diffusion length that is less than the length required for complete light absorption. Core-shell nanowires and nanorods have the potential to alleviate this difficulty because they decouple the length scales of light abso...

Exploiting C-H bond activation is difficult, although some success has been achieved using precious metal catalysts. Recently, it was reported that C-H bonds in aromatic heterocycles were converted to C-Si bonds by reaction with hydrosilanes under the catalytic action of potassium tert-butoxide alone. The use of Earth-abundant potassium cation as a catalyst for C-H bond functionalization seems ...

Macrocyclic ligands form highly selective and kinetically labile complexes with a wide range of cations, including alkali metal and alkaline earth cations. Formation rate constants are high and remarkably insensitive to ligand structure, but decrease systematically with increasing charge density of the cation this behaviour is qualitatively similar to that expected for the dissociative intercha...

Proposed carbon dioxide sequestration scenarios in sedimentary reservoirs require investigation into the interactions between supercritical carbon dioxide, brines, and the mineral phases found in the basin and overlying caprock. Molecular simulations can help to understand the partitioning of metal cations between aqueous solutions and supercritical carbon dioxide where limited experimental dat...

Clay minerals are layer type aluminosilicates that figure in terrestrial biogeochemical cycles, in the buffering capacity of the oceans, and in the containment of toxic waste materials. They are also used as lubricants in petroleum extraction and as industrial catalysts for the synthesis of many organic compounds. These applications derive fundamentally from the colloidal size and permanent str...