Various commonly used organic solvents were dried with several different drying agents. A glovebox-bound coulometric Karl Fischer apparatus with a two-compartment measuring cell was used to determine the efficiency of the drying process. Recommendations are made relating to optimum drying agents/conditions that can be used to rapidly and reliably generate solvents with low residual water content by means of commonly available materials found in most synthesis laboratories. The practical method provides for safer handling and drying of solvents than methods calling for the use of reactive metals, metal hydrides, or solvent distillation.

Abstract:Resistivity, thermoelectric power and heat capacity are investigated in the ferromagnetic superconductor RuSr 2 GdCu 2 O 8 with and without Zn substitution. The thermodynamic signatures of the ordering of the Ru moments and the paramagnetic Gd moments as well as the onset of superconductivity are all clearly seen and quantified. The materials are shown to exhibit bulk superconductivity which coexists with spatially-uniform ferromagnetism. They appear to be typical underdoped superconducting cuprates in which the pseudogap dominates normal-state transport, thermodynamic and substitutional properties. However, a fieldinduced increase in T c could suggest some degree of triplet pairing.

Biomass is the only realistic major alternative source (to crude oil) of hydrocarbon substrates for the commercial synthesis of bulk and fine chemicals. Within biomass, terrestrial sources are the most accessible, and therein lignocellulosic materials are most abundant. Although lignin shows promise for the delivery of certain types of organic molecules, cellulose is a biopolymer with significant potential for conversion into high-volume and high-value chemicals. This review covers the acid-catalyzed conversion of lower value (poly)carbohydrates into valorized organic building-block chemicals (platform molecules). It focuses on those conversions performed in aqueous media or ionic liquids to provide the reader with a perspective on what can be considered a best case scenario, that is, that the overall process is as sustainable as possible.

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Al(OTf)3 was found to be an extremely effective catalyst (at ppm levels) for ring opening reactions of epoxides using a range of alcohols.