Artificial photosynthesis: semiconductor photocatalytic fixation of CO_2 to afford higher organic compounds

Carbon dioxide is an appealing renewable feedstock for industrial chemical processes. This does not mean, however, that all chemical processes using CO_2 are environmentally-friendly. Perspectives on the sustainability of CO_2 utilization and artificial photosynthesis are provided. The discussions focus on the photocatalytic production of C_x (x ≥ 2) compounds, where all the carbon in the products is derived from CO_2. This area of research, while promising, has received far less attention than analogous systems leading to C_1 products

Synthesis, crystal structure and hydroformylation activity of triphenylphosphite modified cobalt catalysts

The dinuclear complex [Co2(CO)6{P(OPh)3}2] (2) has been synthesised and was fully characterised. The solid state structure revealed a trans diaxial geometry, no bridging carbonyls, and Co–Co and Co–P bond lengths of 2.6722(4) and 2.1224(4) Å, respectively. Catalysed hydroformylation of 1-pentene with 2 was attempted at temperatures in the range 120 to 210 °C and pressures between 34 and 80 bar. High pressure spectroscopy (HP-IR and HP-NMR) was used to detect hydride intermediates. High pressure infrared (HP-IR) studies revealed the formation of [HCo(CO)3P(OPh)3] (4) at ca. 110 °C, but at higher temperatures absorption bands corresponding to [HCo(CO)4] (3) were observed. The hydride intermediate 4 has also been synthesised and characterised. Upon increased ligand concentration, HP-IR studies showed the formation of new carbonyl absorption bands due to a higher substituted cobalt carbonyl complex-[HCo(CO)2{P(OPh)3}2] (5), which is believed to be catalytically less active. Complex 5 has been synthesised independently and was fully characterised. A low temperature crystal structural study of 5 revealed a trigonal bipyramidal structure with a trans H–Co–CO arrangement and two equatorial phosphite ligands, the Co–P bond lengths being 2.1093(8) and 2.1076(8) Å, respectively

Models of chronic disease management in primary care for patients with mild to moderate asthma or COPD

The research reported in this paper is a project of the Australian Primary Health Care Research Institute, which is supported by a grant from the Australian Government Department of Health and Ageing under the Primary Health Care Research, Evaluation and Development Strategy

[1,2-Bis(diphenylphosphino)ethane]-diiodidoplatinum(II) dichloromethane disolvate

In the title compound, [PtI2(C26H24P2)]·2CH2Cl2, the PtI2(dppe) [dppe = 1,2-bis­(diphenyl­phosphino)ethane] mol­ecules possess twofold rotation symmetry. The Pt coordination displays a square-planar arrangement, with the sum of the angles around the Pt atom being 360.01 (2)°. The Pt-I distance is 2.6484 (5) Å. In the crystal structure, inter­molecular C-H...I contacts link the PtI2(dppe) mol­ecules into rows along the c axis, with a C...I distance of 3.873 (5) Å

trans-Bromohydridobis-(triphenylphosphine)platinum(II)

The title compound, [PtBrH(C18H15P)2], has a square-planar environment around the Pt atom, with the hydride and bromide ligands being exactly collinear with Pt since they all lie on a crystallographic twofold rotation axis, and with mutually trans triphenyl­phosphine ligands with a P-Pt-P bond angle that is slightly bent towards the hydride [P-Pt-P = 170.81 (5)°]. The Pt-H distance (1.610 Å) is in good agreement with those found in structures determined by neutron diffraction

1,4-Bis[(2-pyridylethyl)iminomethyl]- benzene

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Model-Informed Risk Assessment and Decision Making for an Emerging Infectious Disease in the Asia-Pacific Region

Background: Effective response to emerging infectious disease (EID) threats relies on health care systems that can detect and contain localised outbreaks before they reach a national or international scale. The Asia-Pacific region contains low and middle income countries in which the risk of EID outbreaks is elevated and whose health care systems may require international support to effectively detect and respond to such events. The absence of comprehensive data on populations, health care systems and disease characteristics in this region makes risk assessment and decisions about the provision of such support challenging.\ud \ud Methodology/principal findings: We describe a mathematical modelling framework that can inform this process by integrating available data sources, systematically explore the effects of uncertainty, and provide estimates of outbreak risk under a range of intervention scenarios. We illustrate the use of this framework in the context of a potential importation of Ebola Virus Disease into the Asia-Pacific region. Results suggest that, across a wide range of plausible scenarios, preemptive interventions supporting the timely detection of early cases provide substantially greater reductions in the probability of large outbreaks than interventions that support health care system capacity after an outbreak has commenced.\ud \ud Conclusions/significance: Our study demonstrates how, in the presence of substantial uncertainty about health care system infrastructure and other relevant aspects of disease control, mathematical models can be used to assess the constraints that limited resources place upon the ability of local health care systems to detect and respond to EID outbreaks in a timely and effective fashion. Our framework can help evaluate the relative impact of these constraints to identify resourcing priorities for health care system support, in order to inform principled and quantifiable decision making