Fizikalna kemija (Slovene)

The project includes several research fields. The first field is devoted to studies of thermodynamic and transport properties of solutions containing various charged solutes and interactions between these solutes. They are not only ordinary molecules, such as simple electrolytes, but also more complex molecules, like surface-active molecules or natural and synthetic charged macromolecules. The properties of our interest are activity and osmotic coefficients, enthalpies of dilution, apparent molar volumes, electrical conductivity, transport numbers. The dependence of these quantities on various parameters, for example on temperature and dielectric constant of the solvent, will be studied. Recently our studies with charged polymers (polyelectrolytes) have been extended to water-soluble fullerene electrolytes. In next years we believe these studies will occupy much of our research interest. The second research field deals with studies of thermodynamic stability and conformational transitions of natural polyelectrolytes (proteins and DNA) in aqueous solutions and studies of interactions of proteins with membranes and various biological active ligands with model oligo and polynucleotides. Theoretical studies of hydrogen bond represent our third scope of interest. We intend to study the nature of hydrogen bond between cytosine and phenylalanine (model for binding of NH group to phenyl ring). We shall also continue to study the reactions between organic molecules and ozone.