Effect of sodium phosphate salts on the thermodynamic properties of aqueous solutions of poly(ethylene oxide) 6000 at different temperatures

Precise density, sound velocity, water activity, and phase diagram measurements have been carried out on polyethylene oxide (PEO) in aqueous solutions of sodium di-hydrogen phosphate, di-sodium hydrogen phosphate, and tri-sodium phosphate over a range of temperatures at atmospheric pressure. The experimental density and sound velocity data are used to calculate the apparent specific volume and isentropic compressibility as a function of temperature and concentration. It was found that both of the apparent specific volume and isentropic compressibility of PEO in aqueous solutions increase by increasing temperature and charge on the anion of electrolytes. The results show that the slope of constant water activity lines increased with increasing the temperature and charge on the anion of electrolytes and the vapour pressure depression for an aqueous (PEO + sodium phosphate) system is more than the sum of those for the corresponding binary solutions. Furthermore, the effect of temperature and type of anion of salt on the salting-out effect of polyethylene oxide by sodium phosphate salts has been studied.     

Boehmite silica sulfuric acid: as a new acidic material and reusable heterogeneous nanocatalyst for the various organic oxidation reactions

In this research, project boehmite silica sulfuric acid (Boehmite-SSA) has been applied as new acidic porous catalyst for the selective oxidation of sulfides to sulfoxides and oxidative coupling of thiols to corresponding disulfides using hydrogen peroxide as oxidizing agent. The products have been obtained in short reaction times and high yields. Boehmite nanoparticles was prepared, coated by silica and then reacted with chlorosulfuric acid to obtain Boehmite-SSA. This catalyst was characterized by FT-IR, TGA/DTA, XRD, TEM, SEM, EDS and BET techniques. BET curve of boehmite nanoparticles identified as a typical type IV isotherm (definition by IUPAC), which are the characteristics of mesoporous material. Nitrogen adsorption/desorption measurement indicated that boehmite nanoparticles had BET surface area of about 122.8 m²/g. The catalyst was easily separated and reused for the several runs without significant loss of its catalytic efficiency.     

A characterization of the finite simple group L<Subscript>16</Subscript>(2) by its prime graph

In this paper as the main result we prove that the projective special linear group L ₁₆(2) is uniquely determined by its prime graph. In fact we give a positive answer to an open problem arose in Zavarnitsin (Algebra Logic 43(4), 220–231, 2006) and we obtain a first example of a finite group with connected prime graph which is uniquely determined by its prime graph. This research was in part supported by a grant from IPM (No. 86200023).     

Combined hollow fiber-based liquid-liquid-liquid microextraction and in-situ differential pulse voltammetry to improve selectivity, sensitivity, and interference elimination in electrochemical analysis

In this paper, a combined hollow fiber-based liquid three-phase microextraction and voltammetric method are applied for the first time as a highly selective and sensitive method of electrochemical analysis. Desipramine, used as a model compound was extracted from 8 mL aqueous solution (donor phase, 0.10 mol L⁻¹ NaOH) through a thin phase of propyl benzoate inside the pores of a polypropylene hollow fiber and finally into a 10 μL acidic acceptor solution inside the hollow fiber. Three microelectrodes designed and constructed for the purposes of this study were placed into the two ends of the hollow fiber inside the acceptor solution, and voltammetric analysis was performed in-situ during the extraction. After 15 min, the final stable signal was used for analytical applications. Under the optimized conditions, an enrichment factor of 301 was achieved and the relative standard deviation (R.S.D.) of the method was 6.2% (n = 5). The calibration curve was obtained in the range of 5-5000 nmol L⁻¹ with a reasonable linearity (R² > 0.988) and the limit of detection (LOD) was found to be 0.8 nmol L⁻¹. Finally, the applicability of the proposed method was evaluated by extraction and determination of desipramine in plasma and urine samples without any dilutions.     

A new Orthonormal Polynomial Series Expansion Method in vibration analysis of thin beams with non-uniform thickness

In this article, OPSEM (Orthonormal Polynomial Series Expansion Method) is developed as a new computational approach for the evaluation of thin beams of variable thickness transverse vibration. Capability of the OPSEM in assessing the free vibration frequencies and mode shapes of an Euler–Bernoulli beam with varying thickness is discussed. Multispan continuous beams with various classical boundary conditions are included. Contribution of BOPs (Basic Orthonormal Polynomials) in capturing the beam vibrations is also illustrated in numerical examples to give a quantitative measure of convergence rate. Furthermore, OPSEM is adopted for the forced vibration of a thin beam caused by a moving mass. Dynamics of beams supported by flexible elastic base like free to free beam on elastic foundation are also regarded. Verifications are made via eigenfunction expansion method and GMLSM (Generalized Moving Least Square Method). The very close observed agreement between the results of the two recently mentioned methods and that of OPSEM can be regarded as a guarantee of validity for the newly introduced technique. In comparison with eigenfunction expansion method, the simplicity and handiness of OPSEM in coping with different boundary conditions of the beam can be considered as its benefit for engineering practitioners.     

Stable intersections of affine cantor sets

We construct open sets of pairs of affine Cantor sets (K, K′) with the simplest possible combinatorics (i. e., defined by two affine increasing maps) which have stable intersection, while the product of lateral thicknesses τ_R(K) • τ_L (K′) is smaller than one. Thus, in a strong form, the converse to the following classic result due to Newhouse is not true: if the product of the thicknesses of two Cantor sets is bigger than one then there are translations of them which have stable intersection. We also describe the topological structure of K—K′ for typical pairs (K, K′) in this open set.