Anisotropic magnetic porous assemblies of oxide nanoparticles interconnected via silica bridges for catalytic application

We report the microfluidic chip-based assembly of colloidal silanol-functionalized silica nanoparticles using monodisperse water-in-oil droplets as templates. The nanoparticles are linked via silica bridges, thereby forming superstructures that range from doublets to porous spherical or rod-like micro-objects. Adding magnetite nanoparticles to the colloid generates micro-objects that can be magnetically manipulated. We functionalized such magnetic porous assemblies with horseradish peroxidase and demonstrate the catalytic binding of fluorescent dye-labeled tyramide over the complete effective surface of the superstructure. Such nanoparticle assemblies permit easy manipulation and recovery after a heterogeneous catalytic process while providing a large surface similar to that of the individual nanoparticles.     

Controlled synthesis of fluorescent silica nanoparticles inside microfluidic droplets

We study the droplet-based synthesis of fluorescent silica nanoparticles (50-350 nm size) in a microfluidic chip. Fluorescein-isothiocyanate (FITC) dye is first chemically linked to aminopropyl triethoxysilane (APTES) in ethanol and this reaction product is subsequently mixed with tetraethyl orthosilicate (TEOS) to yield a fluorescent silicon alkoxide precursor solution. The latter reacts with an aqueous ethanol-ammonia hydrolysing mixture inside droplets, forming fluorescent silica nanoparticles. The droplets are obtained by pinching-off side-by-side flowing streams of alkoxide solution/hydrolysing mixture on a microfluidic chip using a Fluorinert oil continuous phase flow. Synthesis in droplets leads to a faster reaction and allows drastically improved nanoparticle size uniformity (down to 3% relative standard deviation for 350 nm size particles) when compared to conventional bulk synthesis methods, thanks to the precise control of reagent concentrations and reaction times offered by the microfluidic format. Incorporating FITC inside silica nanoparticles using our method leads to reduced dye leakage and increases the dye's stability, as evidenced by a reduced photochemical bleaching compared to a pure FITC solution.     

On iterative techniques for computing flow in large two-dimensional discrete fracture networks

Computation of flow in discrete fracture networks often involves solving for hydraulic head values at all intersection points of a large number of stochastically generated fractures inside a bounded domain. For large systems, this approach leads to the generation of problems involving highly sparse matrices which must be solved iteratively. Distributions of fracture lengths spanning over several orders of magnitude, and the randomness of fracture orientations and locations, lead to coefficient matrices that are devoid of any regular structure in the sparsity pattern. In addition to the rapid increase in computational effort with increase in the size of the fracture network, the spread in the distribution of fracture parameters, such as length and transmissivity, dramatically influences the convergence behavior of the system of linear equations. An overview of the discrete fracture network (DFN) methodology for computation of flow is presented along with a comparative study of various Krylov subspace iterative methods for the resulting class of sparse matrices. The rate of convergence of the iterative techniques is found to exhibit a systematic pattern with respect to changes in statistical parameters of the stochastically generated fracture networks. Salient features of the observed trends in the convergence pattern are discussed and guidelines for design of DFN algorithms are provided.     

A microhardness test to analyse thermal change in guargum, polyacrylonitrile and their blends

The Vickers microhardness test is found to be a suitable analytical method for studying thermal change in thin films of polymers. It is utilised to analyse the effect of thermal pretreatment (annealing and quenching) on the surface microhardness of guargum (GG); a natural polymer), polyacrylonitrile (PAN; a synthetic polymer) and their cast blends, guargum-grafted-polyacrylonitrile (GG-g-PAN) and polyacrylonitrile-guargum (PAN-GG). Annealing at various temperatures reveals the change in configuration and crystallinity of thin films of polymers. Peak values of hardness are found to occur in GG, PAN and PAN-GG but not in GG-g-PAN. The quenched hardness for GG is found to be nonlinear with temperature. However, for other polymers quenched hardness decreases, initially, up to a certain temperature and then starts increasing; such temperatures for PAN, PAN-GG and GG-g-PAN are 86, 66 and 86°C, respectively. The behaviour of polymer blends on quenching can be represented by a calculated value of the exponent which is 0·62 and 0·75 for GG-g-PAN and PAN-GG, respectively.     

Paraconductivity of Ge-covered tin films,II

The temperature dependence if the excess electrical conductivity of thin superconducting tin films (a) covered by a protective germanium layer and (b) sandwiched between two germanium layers above the transition temperature has been measured. These thin films have been deposited on glass substrates held at room temperature. It was found that the pair- breaking parameter δ for germanium covered tin filns varies exponentially with normal state sheet resistance R^□_N and could be represented by δ = 3.77×10^-4 exp (1.76R^□_N) in the range 0.28?R^□_N<1.6ohm/?. Higher R^?_N samples show close agreement with Aslamazov-Larkin expression. Information obtained from type (b) samples showed that although protective germanium layer increases the δ values, sandwich type structure lowers it significantly. Results show that such a strong dependence of δ could be related to changes in the Cooper pair relaxation time and the proximity effect.     

Synthesis and properties of some chromium(III) β-diketonate complexes

Summary Equimolar quantities of CrCl₃ · 3THF and-diketones, -dkH, react to yield CrCl₂(-dk) · 2THF and CrCl₂(-dk) · THF complexes in coordinating and noncoordinating solvents respectively. For 1 : 2 and 1 : 3 molar ratios of reactants, derivatives of general formulae CrCl(-dk)₂ and Cr(-dk)₃ (where-dkH = acerylacetrrnc, benzoylacetonc and dibenzoylmethane) have been isolated. All complexes have been characterized by elemental analysis, molecular weights and by i.r. spectra.     

On neutron charge structure

The aim of the present work is to investigate the charge structure of neutron by calculating its root mean square charge radius r _n ^{2 1/2} and the corresponding charge form factor,G _n(q), within the general framework of quark-parton model. The neutron (the nucleon in general) is considered to be disc-like in conformity with the idea of Lorentz invariance. Using the proton charge radius, r _p ² =0·707 fm² as input, our calculations not only reproduce the observed negative sign correctly but also give reasonable value for the magnitude of r _n ² when compared with the experimental limits. –0·16r _n ² –0·11 (fm²). Predictiona are also made for the proton and the neutron charge form factors and the results compared with the data.One of us (D. P.) would like to express his gratitude to Professor A. N. Mitra for his interest and advice in the work, and to Dr. S. M. Mustafa for the warm hospitality at the University of Mosul.     

Synthesis of Silicon Carbide Whiskers from Substituted Silicon Alkoxides and Rayon Fibres

Silicon carbide whiskers (SiC_W) were synthesized through sol-gel process by impregnating the rayon fibres with sols of methyltriethoxysilane (MTEOS), phenyltriethoxysilane (PTEOS) and dimethyldiethoxysilane (DMDEOS) and pyrolyzing the impregnated rayon fibres at 1400°C in argon atmosphere. The SiC_W synthesized through this method were needle like, straight and their aspect ratio was found to be greater than 100 except in the case where DMDEOS was used as silica source.