Plants That Eat Animals: Apart from some spectacular exceptions, such as pitcher plants and Venus fly traps, most plants are thought to acquire nitrogen passively from microbial decomposition and the activities of nitrogen-fixing bacteria. Metarhizium species are common endophytes—fungi that live within plant tissues without causing disease. This genus is also found ubiquitously in soil, where they parasitize insects. In a series of microcosm experiments, Behie et al. (p. 1576 ) investigated whether these fungi could couple their endophytic life-styles with their parasitic modes and be a conduit by which plants could obtain nitrogen from animals. Radio-labeled moth larvae were added to the microcosms in which bean and grass plants were grown, and when the larvae were inoculated with fungi, it was only a matter of days before the nitrogen label was detected in the plants.

We have successfully prepared an elastomeric material exhibiting excellent temperature-controlled self-healing characteristics. A synthetic procedure is provided to graft siloxane chains with maleimidocarboxyphenyl functional groups. A furan-modified polyhedral oligomeric silsesquioxane with flexible tethers was also synthesized to cross-link the siloxane chains via a Diels–Alder reaction. A model system was prepared to study the thermally reversible nature of the cross-linked entities using differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) and nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) experiments. Likewise, dynamic solid-state ¹H NMR experiments confirmed the reversibility of the linkages in the polymeric materials. Elastomers that were completely severed could be reannealed to the point that signs of a defect were imperceptible even by scanning electron microscopy (SEM).

More and more enzymes are being explored as alternatives to conventional catalysts in chemical reactions. To utilize these biocatalysts to their fullest, it is incumbent on researchers to gain a complete understanding of the reaction conditions that particular enzymes will tolerate. To this end siloxane-containing polyesters and polyamides have been produced via N435-mediated catalysis at temperatures well above the normal denaturation temperature for free CalB. Low molecular weight disiloxane-based acceptors release the enzyme from its acylated state with equal proficiency while longer chain siloxanes favours polyester synthesis. The thermal tolerance of the enzyme catalyst is increased using longer chain diesters and generally more hydrophobic substrates.

Certain proteolytic enzymes are capable of mediating the processing of tri- and tetra-alkoxysilanes to form monolithic silicavia the sol–gel process, or silsesquioxane sol–gels under green, solvent-free conditions.