Electrochemical preparation and characterization of a cobalt oxide–platinum composite with promising capacitive and electrocatalytic features

In the present work, boron-doped diamond polycrystalline films were used as support for direct anodic deposition of the cobalt oxide, and continuous Co₃O₄ coatings with reasonably good conductivity were obtained by appropriately adjusting the deposition charge. Further electrochemical deposition of platinum particles on the oxide substrate enabled the formation of a stable composite with a specific capacitance of ca. 431 F?cm^?3 that compares well with that available with similar materials obtained by non-electrochemical methods. Additional advantages of electrochemically obtained composites are the lower content of noble metal, the uniform distribution of the charge over an extended potential range, and, importantly, the simplicity of the preparation method. It was also found that when deposited on a Co₃O₄ substrate, Pt particles show, besides an enhanced active surface area, an improved catalytic activity for methanol anodic oxidation. This behavior was tentatively ascribed to the presence of a high amount of platinum-oxidized species.     

PKP simulation of size effect on interaction field distribution in highly ordered ferromagnetic nanowire arrays

Perpendicular structured nanowire arrays interaction field distributions (IFDs), as revealed from first-order reversal curves (FORC) diagrams, are related to the presence of the demagnetizing field in the system. Despite the similarity between the geometric properties of bit patterned media and mentioned nanowire arrays, FORC diagrams of these two types of systems are not similar essentially due to the different number of magnetic entities influencing the switch of an individual element. We show that one Preisach–Krasnosel'skii–Pokrovskii (PKP) symmetrical hysteron can be representative of an ideal infinite nanowire array when the field is applied along the wires. Starting from this observation, we present a very simple model based on PKP symmetrical hysterons that can be applied to real finite ferromagnetic nanowire arrays, and is able to describe a wide class of experimentally observed FORC distributions, revealing features due to size effects. We also present IFDs modeled for different geometric characteristics such as array size, interwire distance, and nanowire dimensions, and an identification procedure for the proposed model.     

Modelling of sorbic acid diffusion through bacterial cellulose-based antimicrobial films

Antimicrobial packaging protects the product from the external environment and microbial contamination, conferring numerous advantages on human health. Interest in biopolymers as packaging materials has considerably increased recently. Bacterial cellulose is an interesting biomaterial produced as nanofibrils by Acetobacter xylinium and is a promising candidate due to its remarkable properties. New composite materials with antimicrobial properties were developed in this work, containing poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA) as polymer matrix and ground bacterial cellulose (BC) as reinforcing fibres. Sorbic acid was used as an antimicrobial agent because it is a preservative recognised in the food industry. The materials obtained were studied using Fourier-transformed infrared spectroscopy (FTIR). The swelling rate of the composites was also measured. Release experiments of sorbic acid from the composite films into water were performed and the mass transfer phenomena were investigated using Fick’s law of diffusion. The antimicrobial effect was tested against Escherichia coli K12-MG1655. The results obtained indicated that the new biocomposite films could be promising antimicrobial food packaging materials.     

Luminescence rigidochromism and redox chemistry of pyrazolate-bridged binuclear platinum(II) diimine complex intercalated into zirconium phosphate layers

The direct intercalation of a pyrazolate-bridged platinum(II) bipyridyl dimer ([{Pt(dmbpy)(μ-pz)}(2)](2+); dmbpy = 4,4'-dimethyl-2,2'-bipyridine, pz(-) = pyrazolate) within a zirconium phosphate (ZrP) framework has been accomplished. The physical and spectroscopic properties of [{Pt(dmbpy)(μ-pz)}(2)](2+) intercalated in ZrP were investigated by X-ray powder diffraction and X-ray photoelectron, infrared, absorption, and luminescence spectroscopies. Zirconium phosphate layers have a special microenvironment that is capable of supporting a variety of platinum oxidation states. Diffuse reflectance spectra from powders of the blue-gray intercalated materials show the formation of a low-energy band at 600 nm that is not present in the platinum dimer salt. The nonintercalated complex is nonemissive in room-temperature fluid solution, but gives rise to intense blue-green emission in a 4:1 ethanol/methanol 77 K frozen glassy solution. Powders and colloidal suspensions of [{Pt(dmbpy)(μ-pz)}(2)](2+)-exchanged ZrP materials exhibit intense emissions at room-temperature.     

Frames for operators

Frames in Hilbert spaces are a redundant set of vectors which yield a representation for each vector in the space. In the present paper, we give a generalization of frames, which allows, in a stable way, to reconstruct elements from the range of a linear and bounded operator in a Hilbert space.     

The halo of the exotic nucleus 11Li: a single Cooper pair

If neutrons are progressively added to a normal nucleus, the Pauli principle forces them into states of higher momentum. When the core becomes neutron saturated, the nucleus expels most of the wave function of the last neutrons outside to form a halo, which, because of its large size, can have a lower momentum. It is an open question how nature stabilizes such a fragile system and provides the glue needed to bind the halo neutrons to the core. Here, we show that this problem is similar to that of the instability of the normal state of an electron system at zero temperature solved by Cooper, a solution which is at the basis of BCS theory of superconductivity. By mimicking this approach using, aside from the bare nucleon-nucleon interaction, the long wavelength vibrations of the nucleus ¹¹Li, the paradigm of halo nuclei, as tailored glues of the least bound neutrons, we are able to obtain a unified and quantitative picture of the observed properties of ¹¹Li. Received: 9 May 2001 / Accepted: 17 November 2001