Physical, Thermal and Spectral Properties of Biofield Treated 3-Nitroacetophenone

What is it about?

3-Nitroacetophenone (3-NAP) is an organic compound used as an intermediate for the synthesis of pharmaceutical agents. The aim of this study was to evaluate the impact of biofield energy treatment on the physical, thermal and spectral properties of 3-NAP. The study was performed in two groups i.e. control and treated. The control group remained as untreated, and the treated group received Mr. Trivedi’s biofield energy treatment. The control and treated 3-NAP samples were further characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), laser particle size analyzer, surface area analyzer, Fourier transform infrared (FT-IR) spectroscopy, and ultra violet-visible spectroscopy (UV-vis) analysis. The XRD analysis showed decrease in crystallite size of treated 3-NAP by 20.27% as compared to the control sample. However, the XRD peaks of treated sample showed an increase in intensity as compared to the control. The DSC result showed a slight increase in melting temperature of treated 3-NAP (80.75ºC) with respect to the control (79.39ºC). The latent heat of fusion of treated 3-NAP was changed by 16.28% as compared to the control sample. The TGA analysis showed an increase in onset temperature of treated sample (192ºC) as compared to the control sample (182ºC). Further, the maximum thermal decomposition temperature (Tmax) of treated 3-NAP was increased as compared to the control. This showed the increase in thermal stability of treated 3-NAP with respect to control. The treated 3-NAP showed an increase in average particle size (d50) by 27.6% along with an increase in size exhibited by 99% of particles (d99) by 4.9% as compared to the control. Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET) analysis showed a substantial decrease in surface area by 24.6% with respect to the control. The FT-IR analysis showed an emergence of peak at 1558 cm-1 in treated 3-NAP sample as compared to the control. Nevertheless, the UV spectral analysis of treated 3-NAP showed no alterations in absorption peaks as compared to the control. Altogether, the result showed that biofield energy treatment has altered the physical, thermal and spectral properties of treated 3-NAP as compared to the control.

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Why is it important?

Nitroaromatic compounds are one of the important group of industrial chemicals in use today. These organic compounds consist of at least one –NO2 group which is attached to the aromatic ring [1]. Many pharmaceuticals are originated from nitroaromatic compounds. For instance, many substituted nitroaromatic compounds are used to synthesize the diverse collection of indoles that are bioactive components of many drugs and agrochemicals [2]. Nitroacetophenone are nitroaromatic compounds that have been commonly used in the synthesis of chemical and pharmaceutical compounds. 4-Nitroacetophenone based compounds are recently recognized as a class of anti-trypanosomal drug candidates [3]. 2-Nitroacetophenone is used as an intermediate for the synthesis of cinoxacin that is prescribed for urinary tract infections in adults [4]. 3-Nitroacetophenone (3-NAP) is a compound used as intermediate for the synthesis of flurbiprofen that is administered for the treatment of inflammation and arthritis pain [5]. Iradyan et al. synthesized 3-NAP derivatives and investigated its antitumor efficiency [6]. Chalcones are an important class of compounds associated with excellent pharmacological activity [7]. Chalcones are synthesized from 3-NAP as an intermediate compound, which have profound anti-inflammatory [8], anti-ulcerative [9], antibacterial [10], antifungal [11] and antimalarial activities [12]. Pharmaceutical stability is a key factor that determines the therapeutic efficacy and toxicity of medications. According to Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the drug companies should determine a time limit to which they can assure the full potency and safety of the medications [13]. Therefore, chemical and physical stability of the pharmaceutical compounds are more desired quality attributes that directly affect its safety, efficacy, and shelf life [14]. Thus, exploring new methods that can improve the physicochemical properties of active pharmaceutical ingredients will be like the gold standard in the pharmaceutical development. Recently biofield energy treatment was utilized as novel method for changing the physical and thermal properties of various materials such as metals [15, 16], ceramics [17], organic product [18] and spectral properties of various pharmaceutical drugs [19]. Therefore author planned to study the influence of biofield energy treatment on the physical, thermal and spectral properties of 3-NAP. In United States the National Centre for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM), which is a part of the prestigious National Institute of Health (NIH), authorizes the use of Complementary and Alternative Medicine (CAM) therapies as an alternative in the healthcare sector. According to an estimate about 36% of Americans regularly uses some form of CAM [20], in their day-to-day activities. CAM embraces numerous energy-healing therapies; biofield therapy is one of the energy medicine used worldwide to alleviate overall human health. Biofield energy treatment consists of practices based on subtle energy field and generally reflect the concept that human being are infused with this form of energy [21]. Researchers have shown that a unique bioenergetic field surrounds and permeates the human body [22]. This bioenergetic field regulates the human health and during disease condition this unique field is depleted [23]. Recently some medical technologies were used to measure this human biofield [24]. Therefore, it is envisaged that human beings have the ability to harness the energy from the environment/Universe and can transmit into any object (living or non-living) around the Globe. The object(s) will always receive the energy and responding in a useful manner that is called biofield energy. Mr. Trivedi is known to transform the characteristics of various living and non-living things using his unique biofield energy. This biofield energy treatment is also known as The Trivedi Effect®. It is known to change the phenotype characteristics of microbes [25, 26] and improved the growth and anatomical characteristics of medicinal plants [27, 28]. Due to pharmaceutical significance of 3-NAP as an intermediate and literature reports on biofield energy treatment as a useful approach, the present work was undertaken to evaluate the impact of this treatment on physical, thermal and spectral properties of 3-NAP.

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