Effect of iodine sorption on the free volume of polycarbonate

 The effect of iodine sorption on the free volume of polycarbonate is investigated by Positron Annihilation Lifetime method. The observed results are interpreted in terms of the Charge Transfer Complex formation and precipitation of iodine at the initial and final stages of sorption, respectively. At higher levels of sorption, changes in the second lifetime and its intensity seem to suggest a conformational transformation, probably due to the net change in the amorphous-crystalline boundary regions of the polymer matrix. The free volume cavities have been predominantly occupied by I^- ₃ species and the diffusion process obeys Fick’s law. An exponential type correlation has been observed between fractional free volume and the diffusion coefficient. Received: 13 June 1996/Accepted: 20 September 1996     

Preparing Science Teachers in an Era of Reform: Practitioners' Perspectives of Methods Courses

With recent national calls for the reform of science education have come standards that delineate not only science content but also assessment, pedagogy, and teachers’ professional development. If teachers must teach science differently, then teacher preparation must change. This study asked 31 inservice secondary science teachers to complete a survey about topics for inclusion in a secondary science methods course. Respondents ranked a list of prespecified topics and had an opportunity to suggest other topics for inclusion in the course. Results showed that the majority of prespecified potential topics were judged important enough by these teachers to warrant inclusion in a methods course, though no individual added topic appeared on more than two surveys. Results demonstrate that these teachers believe teaching many of the traditional topics in science methods courses is still needed. In addition, they advocated the inclusion of several topics that either represent recent technological and theoretical advances, or longstanding ideas that have recently received considerable attention.     

Asymptotics of the necessary sample size under small error probabilities

The asymptotics of the necessary sample size is considered in testing close hypotheses when the error probabilities vanish. Proceedings of the XVII Seminar on Stability Problems for Stochastic Models, Kazan, Russia, 1995, Part III.     

Halomethanes in tri-n-octylamine and squalane mixtures at infinite dilution

The retention behavior of eight halomethanes and four saturated hydrocarbons was measured in gas chromatographic stationary phases consisting in tri-n-octylamine (TOA), squalane (SQ) and six TOA+SQ mixtures, at 55.0, 58.5, 62.5 and 65.0°C. Equlibrium constants for complex formation were extracted from experimental data by using a lattice model developed by Martire. The results may be interpreted in terms of the formation of weak hydrogen-bonded complexes, with sociation constants of about 0.13 L-mol^–1 for haloforms and 0.07 L-mol^–1 for dihalomethanes at 60°C.     

A poincaré-bendixson theorem for analytic families of vector fields

We provide a characterization of the limit periodic sets for analytic families of vector fields under the hypothesis that the first jet is non-vanishing at any singular point. Also, applying the family desingularization method, we reduce the complexity of some of these sets.     

Influence of the sulfonate countercation on the thermal stability of nafion perfluorosulfonate membranes

We report a strong dependence of the thermal stability of Nafion® perfluorosulfonate ionomer on the nature of the counterion associated with the fixed sulfonate site. These results were obtained using thermal gravimetric analysis on a series of alkali metal and alkyl ammonium cation-exchanged Nafion films. We have found that the temperature of decomposition of Nafion is inversely dependent on the size of the exchanged cation; i.e., Nafion films show improved thermal stability as the size of the counter cation decreases. We attribute this inverse relationship of thermal stability with counterion size to an initial decomposition reaction which is strongly influenced by the strength of the sulfonate-coun-terion interaction. © 1993 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

Experimental studies of microwave amplification in the ion-focusedregime

Studies of microwave amplification with an in-focused electron beam drawn from an induction injector are reported. A free-electron laser (FEL) operating at 9.4 GHz and employing ion-focusing within the interaction region has achieved power in excess of 30 MW at 9.4 GHz, with a beam energy of 0.8 MeV and current of 0.7 kA. Peak gain is 20 dB/m, with no saturation after 15 wiggler periods. Also reported are the first evolution and detuning data for an ion-channel laser/maser (ICL). Two shortcomings of the prematurely halted ICL studies are poor frequency discrimination and a large axial plasma gradient. Prospects for operation with an upgraded 1.6 MeV accelerator are discussed     

Pseudo-epitaxial C60 films prepared by a hot-wall method

We have used both reflection-geometry and grazing-incidence-geometry X-ray scattering to study thin films of C₆₀ evaporated onto mica substrates via a hot-wall technique. The growth mode yields close-packed C₆₀ planes, which are parallel to the substrate surface and which exhibit out-of-plane correlation lengths of 850 Å. In the film plane the C₆₀ is at best pseudo-epitaxial, with a 0.9° distribution of crystallite orientations, a 450 Å in-plane correlation length, and a 3.7% lattice mismatch, better than obtained by other thin film techniques but far from the accepted definition of single crystal thin film epitaxy.     

Nd2Fe14B化合物磁晶各向异性起源的理论研究

本文根据Nd₂Fe₁₄B化合物中存有少量巡游电子的基本实验事实,提出了在Nd₂Fe₁₄B中配位子所产生的晶场和巡游电子所产生的电场共同造成了Nd离子磁晶各向异性的理论模型。提出并解决了计算巡游电子同中心Nd离子相互作用的理论方法。在同时考虑Nd离子所受配位子的晶场和巡游电子的电场的作用情况下,用单离子模型计算了Nd₂Fe₁₄B中Nd离子所产生的磁晶各向异性及其随温度的变化。所 关键词：     

Increasing the accuracy of eigenvalue computation in the spectral problem

A simple method is proposed for increasing the accuracy of computation of the eigenvalues of elliptic operators, which does not require high-order accurate schemes.Translated from Vychislitel'naya i Prikladnaya Matematika, No. 63, pp. 63–68, 1987.