Two microbial lipases from Burkholderia cepacia and Pseudomonas fluorescens were evaluated as catalysts for the enzymatic transesterification of beef tallow with ethanol and the most efficient lipase source was selected by taking into account the properties of the product to be used as fuel. Both lipases were immobilized on an epoxy silica-polyvinyl alcohol composite by covalent immobilization and used to perform the reactions under the following operational conditions: beef tallow-to-ethanol molar ratio of 1:9, 45ºC and 400 units of enzymatic activity per gram of fat. Products, characterized using Fourier Transform Infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), viscosimetry, thermogravimetry and ¹H NMR spectroscopy, suggested that the biodiesel sample obtained in the reaction catalyzed by Burkholderia cepacia lipase has the best set of properties for fuel usage.

We have approximated the second virial coefficients obtained from the Stockmayer potential using a two parameter, analytical correlation. The correlation eliminates the need for integration of the potential over nearly the entire range of reduced temperatures. The equation is valid from 0 to 1.5 reduced dipole moment and uses the Boyle temperature as a normalizing variable. Because the equation is a correlation, the parameters do not necessarily have any physical meaning. We have applied the new equation to nonpolar compounds, aromatics, freons, alcohols, ethers, aldehydes, and acids.

Em várias regiões do interior do Estado de São Paulo, notificou-se a partir do final de 1984 a 1986, a ocorrência de doença até então desconhecida, com características clínicas, em muitos aspectos, semelhante à meningococcemia. Esta síndrome foi denominada Febre Purpúrica Brasileira (FPB). Em quinze dos casos com quadro clínico compatível com a síndrome, o Haemophilus aegyptius foi isolado a partir de culturas de sangue, de líquido cefalorraquidiano sanguinolento, de secreção conjuntival e orofaríngea. Analisa-se a importância deste achado, face à existência de somente um relato na literatura, de infecção sistêmica por bactérias desta espécie.

In the hinterland of the São Paulo State, Brazil, a so far non observed disease has been reported from 1984 to 1986. The disease had the clinical characteristics of meningococcemia and the syndrome was named Brazilian Purpuric Fever. In fifteen patients Haemophilus aegyptius was isolated from blood cultures, spinal fluid and conjunctival and oropharyngeal secretions. This paper analyses the importance of such findings in relation to one single previous report of a systemic infection caused by such bacteria.