New bis- and tetrakis-1,2,3-triazole derivatives: Synthesis, DNA cleavage, molecular docking, antimicrobial, antioxidant activity and acid dissociation constants.

In this study, a series of bis- and tetrakis-1,2,3-triazole derivatives were synthesized using copper-catalyzed azide-alkyne cycloaddition (CuAAC) click chemistry in 73-95% yield. The bis- and tetrakis-1,2,3-triazoles exhibited significant DNA cleavage activity while the tetrakis-1,2,3-triazole analog 6g completely degraded the plasmid DNA. Molecular docking simulations suggest that compound 6g acts as minor groove binder of DNA by binding through several noncovalent interactions with base pairs. All bis- and tetrakis-1,2,3-triazole derivatives were screened for antibacterial activity against E. coli, B. cereus, S. aureus, P. aeruginosa, E. hirae, L. pneumophila subsp. pneumophila strains and antifungal activity against microfungus C. albicans and C. tropicalis strains. Compound 4d exhibited the best antibacterial activity among bis-1,2,3-triazoles against E. coli and E. hirae, while 6c exhibited the best antibacterial activity among tetrakis-1,2,3-triazoles against E. hirae. Furthermore, the best antifungal activity against C. albicans and C. tropicalis was reported for the compound 5, while 6d displayed the best antifungal activity against C. tropicalis and C. albicans. Reasonable iron chelating activities and DPPH radical scavenging abilities were found for some of the compounds. Finally, the acid dissociation constants (pKa) of the bis-1,2,3-triazoles were also determined with the help of HYPERQUAD program using the data obtained from potentiometric titrations. The reported data here concludes that the bis- and tetrakis-1,2,3-triazoles are important cores that should be considered for further development of especially new anticancer agents acting through the DNA cleavage activity.

Multivariate Analysis Approaches for Dimension and Shape Discrimination of Vitis vinifera Varieties.

In this study, berry dimensions and shape traits, which are important for the design of the grape processing system and the classification of 10 different grape varieties grown in same ecological conditions ('Ata Sarisi', 'Baris', 'Dimiski', 'Hatun Parmagi', 'Helvani', 'Horoz Karasi', 'Hönüsü', 'Italia', 'Mevlana Sarisi', and 'Red Globe') were determined; differences between the varieties were identified with the use of discriminant analysis. The largest grape varieties were identified as 'Ata Sarisi' and 'Red Globe'. The 'Red Globe' and 'Helvani' varieties had geometrically sphere-like shape. The 'Baris' variety had the lowest size averages. According to elliptic Fourier analysis, the primary source of shape variation was ellipse and sphere-looking varieties. However, shape variation was seen due to the existence of a small number of drop-like varieties. According to discriminant analysis, shape differences of the varieties were defined by two discriminant functions. Based on these discriminant functions, the greatest classification performance was achieved for 'Mevlana Sarisi' and 'Dimiski'. In scatter plots, three shape definitions (sphere, ellipse, and drop) were made for grape varieties. Cluster analysis revealed 4 sub-groups. The first sub-group included the 'Mevlana Sarisi' variety; the second sub-group included the 'Hönüsü', 'Hatun Parmagi', 'Dimiski', and 'Horoz Karasi' varieties; the third sub-group included the 'Ata Sarisi' variety; the fourth sub-group included the 'Baris', 'Helvani', 'Italia', and 'Red Globe' varieties. The variety in the first group had a geometrically ellipse-like shape, the largest length, and the smallest width. The size data were the smallest for the second sub-group. The third sub-group, with the ellipse-like shape, had the large size data. The grape varieties the closest to the sphere were classified in the fourth group, and these varieties had the large sizes.

Morphological Characteristics of Grapevine Cultivars and Closed Contour Analysis with Elliptic Fourier Descriptors.

Morphology is the most visible and distinct character of plant organs and is accepted as one of the most important tools for plant biologists, plant breeders and growers. A number of methods based on plant morphology are applied to discriminate in particular close cultivars. In this study, image processing analysis was used on 20 grape cultivars ("Amasya beyazi", "Antep karasi", "Bahçeli karasi", "Çavus", "Cevsen", "Crimson", "Dimrit", "Erenköy beyazi", "Hafizali", "Karasabi", "Kirmizi", "Izabella (Isabella) ", "Morsabi", "Müsgüle", "Nuniya", "Royal", "Sultani çekirdeksiz (Sultanina)", "Yalova incisi", "Yerli beyazv", "Yuvarlak çekirdeksiz") to classify them. According to image processing analysis, the longest and the greatest projected area values were observed in "Antep karasi" cultivar. The "Sultani çekirdeksiz" cultivar had the least geometric mean diameter. The greatest sphericity ratios were observed in "Yerli beyaz", "Erenköy beyazi" and "Amasya beyazi" cultivars. According to principal component analysis, dimensional attributes were identified as the most significant source of variation discriminant grape cultivars from each other. Morphological differences between the cultivars were explained by sphericity and elongation variables. According to elliptic Fourier analysis (EFA) results, grape morphology largely looks like ellipse and sphere. However, there are some cultivars that look similar to a water drop. The cultivars with similar morphology were identified by a pair-wise comparison test conducted with the use of linear discriminant analysis, and they were presented in a scatter plot. According to cluster analysis, present grape cultivars were classified into seven sub-groups, which indicated great diversity.

Study on crystallographic and electronic structure of micrometre-scale ZnO and ZnO:B rods via X-ray absorption fine-structure spectroscopy.

X-ray absorption near-edge structure (XANES) and extended X-ray absorption fine-structure (EXAFS) spectra were recorded to investigate the electronic structure and local crystal structure of ZnO and ZnO:B powders produced via hydrothermal synthesis. ZnO and ZnO:B grow as micrometre-scale rods with hexagonal shape, as confirmed by scanning electron microscopy micrographs. The number of broken ZnO:B rods increases with increasing B concentration, as observed in the images, due to B atoms locating in between the Zn and O atoms which weakens and/or breaks the Zn-O bonds. However, no disorder within the crystallographic structure of ZnO upon B doping is observed from X-ray diffraction results, which were supported by EXAFS results. To determine the atomic locations of boron atoms in the crystal structure and their influence on the zinc atoms, EXAFS data were fitted with calculated spectra using the crystal structure parameters obtained from the crystallographic analysis of the samples. EXAFS data fitting and complementary k-weight analysis revealed the positions of the B atoms - their positions were determined to be in between the Zn and O atoms.

Synthesis, biological properties, and acid dissociation constant of novel naphthoquinone-triazole hybrids.

A series of novel 1,4-naphthoquinone-triazole hybrids, N-(3-amino-1,4-dioxo-1,4-dihydronaphthalen-2-yl)-2-(4-R-1H-1,2,3-triazol-1-yl)acetamide, was synthesized by click chemistry in the presence of sodium ascorbate and copper(II) sulfate pentahydrate in 81-94% yield. Various biological properties of the synthesized compounds including DNA binding/cleavage, antioxidant, antibacterial and antifungal properties were evaluated. The DNA binding study was performed using dsDNA and G-quadruplex DNA. All of the compounds showed fluorescence increase in the presence of DNA, regardless of the structure. Up to 2.9 and 2.5 times fluorescence increase upon incubation with double stranded or G-quadruplex DNA was detected for 5f and 5g, respectively. The docking studies performed on dsDNA and G-quadruplex structures suggested compounds' mode of interactions were populated around the grooves. All of the compounds showed excellent DNA cleavage activity and 5e was almost degraded the plasmid DNA. The highest radical scavenging activity was obtained as 89.9% at 200 mg/L with 5d. However, the highest ferrous chelating activity was obtained as 68.1% at 200 mg/L with 5g. The compounds exhibited antimicrobial activity against Bacillus cereus, Legionella pneumophila subsp. pneumophila, Staphylococcus aureus, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Escherichia coli and Enterococcus hirae as bacteria strains and Candida albicans and Candida tropicalis as microfungus strains. The compounds exhibited antibacterial and antifungal activity in the range of 4-128 µg/mL and 16-128 µg/mL, respectively. The best antimicrobial activity was obtained with 5d and 5e with a MIC value of 4 µg/mL against Enterococcus hirae. The acid dissociation constants (pKa) were determined potentiometrically in 20% (v/v) dimethyl sulfoxide-water hydro-organic solvent at an ionic background of 0.1 mol/L of NaCl, at 25 ± 0.1 °C. Five pKa values were obtained for each ligand.