Portable infrared laser spectroscopy for on-site mycotoxin analysis

Mycotoxins are toxic secondary metabolites of fungi that spoil food, and severely impact human health (e.g., causing cancer). Therefore, the rapid determination of mycotoxin contamination including deoxynivalenol and aflatoxin B(1) in food and feed samples is of prime interest for commodity importers and processors. While chromatography-based techniques are well established in laboratory environments, only very few (i.e., mostly immunochemical) techniques exist enabling direct on-site analysis for traders and manufacturers. In this study, we present MYCOSPEC - an innovative approach for spectroscopic mycotoxin contamination analysis at EU regulatory limits for the first time utilizing mid-infrared tunable quantum cascade laser (QCL) spectroscopy. This analysis technique facilitates on-site mycotoxin analysis by combining QCL technology with GaAs/AlGaAs thin-film waveguides. Multivariate data mining strategies (i.e., principal component analysis) enabled the classification of deoxynivalenol-contaminated maize and wheat samples, and of aflatoxin B(1) affected peanuts at EU regulatory limits of 1250 μg kg(−1) and 8 μg kg(−1), respectively

Magnon polaron formed by selectively coupled coherent magnon and phonon modes of a surface patterned ferromagnet

Strong coupling between two quanta of different excitations leads to the formation of a hybridized state which paves a way for exploiting new degrees of freedom to control phenomena with high efficiency and precision. A magnon polaron is the hybridized state of a phonon and a magnon, the elementary quanta of lattice vibrations and spin waves in a magnetically-ordered material. A magnon polaron can be formed at the intersection of the magnon and phonon dispersions, where their frequencies coincide. The observation of magnon polarons in the time domain has remained extremely challenging because the weak interaction of magnons and phonons and their short lifetimes jeopardize the strong coupling required for the formation of a hybridized state. Here, we overcome these limitations by spatial matching of magnons and phonons in a metallic ferromagnet with a nanoscale periodic surface pattern. The spatial overlap of the selected phonon and magnon modes formed in the periodic ferromagnetic structure results in a high coupling strength which, in combination with their long lifetimes allows us to find clear evidence of an optically excited magnon polaron. We show that the symmetries of the localized magnon and phonon states play a crucial role in the magnon polaron formation and its manifestation in the optically excited magnetic transients

Transition magnon modes in thin ferromagnetic nanogratings

This work presents micromagnetic simulations in ferromagnetic nanogratings for the full range of directions of an applied in-plane external magnetic field. We focus on the modification of the magnon mode characteristics when the magnetic field orientation is gradually changed between the classical Damon-Eshbach and backward-volume geometries. We found that in a specific range of field directions, the magnon mode parameters differ significantly from the parameters in the classical cases; namely, the modes are characterized by complex spatial distributions and have low group velocities. The center of this range corresponds to the direction of the external magnetic field, which gives the maximal nonuniform distribution of the static magnetization in the nanogratings

Optical excitation of single- and multi-mode magnetization precession in Fe-Ga nanolayers

We demonstrate a variety of precessional responses of the magnetization to ultrafast optical excitation in nanolayers of Galfenol (Fe,Ga), which is a ferromagnetic material with large saturation magnetization and enhanced magnetostriction. The particular properties of Galfenol, including cubic magnetic anisotropy and weak damping, allow us to detect up to 6 magnon modes in a 120nm layer, and a single mode with effective damping _eff = 0.005 and frequency up to 100 GHz in a 4- nm layer. This is the highest frequency observed to date in time-resolved experiments with metallic ferromagnets. We predict that detection of magnetisation precession approaching THz frequencies should be possible with Galfenol nanolayers

Protected Long-Distance Guiding of Hypersound Underneath a Nanocorrugated Surface

In nanoscale communications, high-frequency surface acoustic waves are becoming effective data carriers and encoders. On-chip communications require acoustic wave propagation along nanocorrugated surfaces which strongly scatter traditional Rayleigh waves. Here, we propose the delivery of information using subsurface acoustic waves with hypersound frequencies of ∼20 GHz, which is a nanoscale analogue of subsurface sound waves in the ocean. A bunch of subsurface hypersound modes are generated by pulsed optical excitation in a multilayer semiconductor structure with a metallic nanograting on top. The guided hypersound modes propagate coherently beneath the nanograting, retaining the surface imprinted information, at a distance of more than 50 μm which essentially exceeds the propagation length of Rayleigh waves. The concept is suitable for interfacing single photon emitters, such as buried quantum dots, carrying coherent spin excitations in magnonic devices and encoding the signals for optical communications at the nanoscale

High-performance liquid chromatography–tandem mass spectrometry in the identification and determination of phase I and phase II drug metabolites

Applications of tandem mass spectrometry (MS/MS) techniques coupled with high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) in the identification and determination of phase I and phase II drug metabolites are reviewed with an emphasis on recent papers published predominantly within the last 6 years (2002–2007) reporting the employment of atmospheric pressure ionization techniques as the most promising approach for a sensitive detection, positive identification and quantitation of metabolites in complex biological matrices. This review is devoted to in vitro and in vivo drug biotransformation in humans and animals. The first step preceding an HPLC-MS bioanalysis consists in the choice of suitable sample preparation procedures (biomatrix sampling, homogenization, internal standard addition, deproteination, centrifugation, extraction). The subsequent step is the right optimization of chromatographic conditions providing the required separation selectivity, analysis time and also good compatibility with the MS detection. This is usually not accessible without the employment of the parent drug and synthesized or isolated chemical standards of expected phase I and sometimes also phase II metabolites. The incorporation of additional detectors (photodiode-array UV, fluorescence, polarimetric and others) between the HPLC and MS instruments can result in valuable analytical information supplementing MS results. The relation among the structural changes caused by metabolic reactions and corresponding shifts in the retention behavior in reversed-phase systems is discussed as supporting information for identification of the metabolite. The first and basic step in the interpretation of mass spectra is always the molecular weight (MW) determination based on the presence of protonated molecules [M+H]+ and sometimes adducts with ammonium or alkali-metal ions, observed in the positive-ion full-scan mass spectra. The MW determination can be confirmed by the [M-H]- ion for metabolites providing a signal in negative-ion mass spectra. MS/MS is a worthy tool for further structural characterization because of the occurrence of characteristic fragment ions, either MSn analysis for studying the fragmentation patterns using trap-based analyzers or high mass accuracy measurements for elemental composition determination using time of flight based or Fourier transform mass analyzers. The correlation between typical functional groups found in phase I and phase II drug metabolites and corresponding neutral losses is generalized and illustrated for selected examples. The choice of a suitable ionization technique and polarity mode in relation to the metabolite structure is discussed as well

Industrial scale isolation, structural and spectroscopic characterization of epiisopiloturine from Pilocarpus microphyllus stapf leaves: a promising alkaloid against schistosomiasis

This paper presents an industrial scale process for extraction, purification, and isolation of epiisopiloturine (EPI) (2(3H)- Furanone,dihydro-3-(hydroxyphenylmethyl)-4-[(1-methyl-1H-imidazol-4-yl)methyl]-, [3S-[3a(R*),4b]]), which is an alkaloid from jaborandi leaves (Pilocarpus microphyllus Stapf). Additionally for the first time a set of structural and spectroscopic techniques were used to characterize this alkaloid. EPI has shown schistomicidal activity against adults and young forms, as well as the reduction of the egg laying adult worms and low toxicity to mammalian cells (in vitro). At first, the extraction of EPI was done with toluene and methylene chloride to obtain a solution that was alkalinized with ammonium carbonate. The remaining solution was treated in sequence by acidification, filtration and alkalinization. These industrial procedures are necessary in order to remove impurities and subsequent application of the high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC). The HPLC was employed also to remove other alkaloids, to obtain EPI purity higher than 98%. The viability of the method was confirmed through HPLC and electrospray mass spectrometry, that yielded a pseudo molecular ion of m/z equal to 287.1 Da. EPI structure was characterized by single crystal X-ray diffraction (XRD), 1H and 13C nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) in deuterated methanol/chloroform solution, vibrational spectroscopy and mass coupled thermal analyses. EPI molecule presents a parallel alignment of the benzene and the methyl imidazol ring separated by an interplanar spacing of 3.758 Å indicating a π-π bond interaction. The imidazole alkaloid melts at 225°C and decomposes above 230°C under air. EPI structure was used in theoretical Density Functional Theory calculations, considering the single crystal XRD data in order to simulate the NMR, infrared and Raman spectra of the molecule, and performs the signals attribution

Studies of complex reactions using modem hyphenated methods: α-Pinene ozonolysis as a model reaction

Modern analytical equipment, in this case the combinations of gas chromatography (GC) with mass spectrometry (MS) and infrared spectroscopy (IR) and liquid chromatography (LC) with mass spectrometry, nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy and infrared spectroscopy, respectively, have been used to monitor complex reactions that do not only form one or two but a larger number of products. Additionally, side reactions of one primary product with a reactant form a second line of secondary products. To be able to propose formation pathways or even mechanistic interpretation of reactions like these, sophisticated analytical instrumentation is necessary to be able to observe all steps of such a reaction. In this case, the gas phase reaction of α-pinene with ozone has been used as a model reaction. A number of both volatile and low-volatile reaction products could be characterized and formation pathways for a reaction with ozone and OH radicals were proposed