The ultimate goal of modeling—Simulation of system and plant performance

Modern production processes in chemical, pharmaceutical and biological industries are characterized by complex process structures, which consist of different apparatuses and process steps. Modeling the entire process requires simulating all units altogether, while taking into account interconnections between them. Nevertheless, in the area of solids processing, there is nowadays an unfilled gap from the side of computer support of process modeling in allowing effective optimization and prediction of the behavior of the whole plant.This paper presents a tool for flowsheet simulation which allows the simulation of the stationary behavior of complex processes dealing with solids and its extension towards dynamic modeling. Also, a new simulation concept is proposed on the basis of the multiscale approach. On the macroscale, flowsheet simulation is performed with the help of the SolidSim system. Parameters for the macromodels in SolidSim are predicted by microscale simulation. The models for the two scales are then coupled by inter-scale communication laws. Application of the proposed modeling concept is shown by an example of fluidized bed granulation.     

Impact of dendritic interface modifiers on phase behavior of polyvinylcarbazol-CdSe/ZnS nanocomposite films

The phase behavior of mixtures of poly(9-vinylcarbazol) (PVK) and CdSe/ZnS quantum dots (QDs) were studied depending on the nature of the surfactant used as QDs shell, namely, “native surfactant” (NS) originated from the QDs synthesis, and specially designed two-component interface modifiers comprising of dendritic phosphonic acids possessing alkyl- or cyano-terminal groups and hexyl phosphonic acid as a cosurfactant. It is shown, that the nature of interface modifier dramatically influence on distribution of QDs in the nanocomposite film. Thus, both the “native surfactant” and alkyl-containing dendritic interface modifiers favors to phase segregation of QDs in the resulting nanocomposites where two-dimensional aggregates are localized near-surface layer of the PVK film. In contrast, the cyano-containing dendritic interface modifier provides the homogeneous QDs distribution through the film thickness. We determined that the concentration quenching of QDs photoluminescence is observed for PVK/QD(NS) film. For PVK films containing QDs grafted with dendritic surfactants, the luminescent intensities increase vs QD concentration up to 80–85 wt%.     

Navigating α-Synuclein Aggregation Inhibition: Methods,Mechanisms, and Molecular Targets

Parkinson's disease is a yet incurable, age-related neurodegenerative disorder characterized by the aggregation of small neuronal protein α-synuclein into amyloid fibrils. Inhibition of this process is a prospective strategy for developing a disease-modifying treatment. We overview here small molecule, peptide, and protein inhibitors of α-synuclein fibrillization reported to date. Special attention was paid to the specificity of inhibitors and critical analysis of their action mechanisms. Namely, the importance of oxidation of polyphenols and cross-linking of α-synuclein into inhibitory dimers was highlighted. We also compared strategies of targeting monomeric, oligomeric, and fibrillar α-synuclein species, thoroughly discussed the strong and weak sides of different approaches to testing the inhibitors.     

Predictive tracking of an object by a pan–tilt camera of a robot

Nonlinear Dynamics - Moving-object tracking using a pan–tilt camera setup is quite a well-known task in robotics. However, the presented research addresses specific properties of the tracked...