Surface charging behaviors of electrocatalytic interfaces with partially charged chemisorbates

The surface charge is a key concept in electrochemistry. Mathematically, the surface charge is obtained from a spatial integration of the volume charge along a particular direction. Ambiguities thus arise in choosing the starting and ending points of the integration. As for electrocatalytic interfaces, the presence of chemisorbates further complicates the situation. In this minireview, I adopt a definition of the surface charge within a continuum picture of the electric double layer. I will introduce surface charging behaviors of firstly ordinary electrochemical interfaces and then electrocatalytic interfaces featuring partially charged chemisorbates. Particularly, the origin of nonmonotonic surface charging behaviors of electrocatalytic interfaces is explained using a primitive model. Finally, a brief account of previous studies on the nonmonotonic surface charging behavior is presented, as a subline of the spectacular history of electric double layer.     

Multivariate optimization and comparison between conventional extraction (CE) and ultrasonic-assisted extraction (UAE) of carotenoid extraction from cashew apple

Carotenoids are an essential component of cashew and can be used in pharmaceuticals, cosmetics, natural pigment, food additives, among other applications. The present work focuses on optimizing and comparing conventional and ultrasound-assisted extraction methods. Every optimization step took place with a 1:1 (w:w) mixture of yellow and red cashew apples lyophilized and ground in a cryogenic mill. A Simplex-centroid design was applied for both methods, and the solvents acetone, methanol, ethanol, and petroleum ether were evaluated. After choosing the extractor solvent, a central composite design was applied to optimize the sample mass (59–201 mg) and extraction time (6–34 min). The optimum conditions for the extractor solvent were 38% acetone, 30% ethanol, and 32% petroleum ether for CE and a mixture of 44% acetone and 56% methanol for UAE. The best experimental conditions for UAE were a sonication time of 19 min and a sample mass of 153 mg, while the CE was 23 min and 136 mg. Comparing red and yellow cashews, red cashews showed a higher carotenoid content in both methodologies. The UAE methodology was ca. 21% faster, presented a more straightforward composition of extracting solution, showed an average yield of superior carotenoid content in all samples compared to CE. Therefore, UAE has demonstrated a simple, efficient, fast, low-cost adjustment methodology and a reliable alternative for other applications involving these bioactive compounds in the studied or similar matrix.     

Theoretical study on the mechanism for the excited-state double proton transfer process of an asymmetric Schiff base ligand

Excited-state double proton transfer (ESDPT) in the 1-[(2-hydroxy-3-methoxy-benzylidene)-hydrazonomethyl]-naphthalen-2-ol (HYDRAVH₂) ligand was studied by the density functional theory and time-dependent density functional theory method. The analysis of frontier molecular orbitals, infrared spectra, and non-covalent interactions have cross-validated that the asymmetric structure has an influence on the proton transfer, which makes the proton transfer ability of the two hydrogen protons different. The potential energy surfaces in both S₀ and S₁ states were scanned with varying O-H bond lengths. The results of potential energy surface analysis adequately proved that the HYDRAVH₂ can undergo the ESDPT process in the S₁ state and the double proton transfer process is a stepwise proton transfer mechanism. Our work can pave the way towards the design and synthesis of new molecules.     

Ergodic stationary distribution and practical application of a hybrid stochastic cholera transmission model with waning vaccine-induced immunity under nonlinear regime switching

Considering the effect of stochasticity including white noise and colored noise, this paper aims to study a hybrid stochastic cholera epidemic model with waning vaccine-induced immunity and nonlinear telegraph perturbations. First, we derive a critical value ${?}_0^C$ related to the basic reproduction number ${?}_0$ of the deterministic model. The key aim of this paper is to generalize the θ-stochastic criterion method proposed by the recent work (Han et al. in Chaos Solit Fract 140:110238, 2020) to eliminate nonlinear telegraph perturbations. Next, via constructing several θ-stochastic Lyapunov functions and using the generalized method, we further prove that the stochastic model have a unique ergodic stationary distribution under ${?}_0^C>1$. Results show that the prevention and control of cholera epidemic depend on low transmission rate and small telegraph perturbations. Finally, the corresponding numerical simulations are performed to illustrate our analytical results and a practical application on the Somalia cholera outbreak is shown at the end of this paper.     

Mean field limits for nonlinear spatially extended Hawkes processes with exponential memory kernels

We consider spatially extended systems of interacting nonlinear Hawkes processes modeling large systems of neurons placed in ${\mathbb{R}}^d$ and study the associated mean field limits. As the total number of neurons tends to infinity, we prove that the evolution of a typical neuron, attached to a given spatial position, can be described by a nonlinear limit differential equation driven by a Poisson random measure. The limit process is described by a neural field equation. As a consequence, we provide a rigorous derivation of the neural field equation based on a thorough mean field analysis.     

The double deflating technique for irreducible singular M-matrix algebraic Riccati equations in the critical case

As is known, Alternating-Directional Doubling Algorithm (ADDA) is quadratically convergent for computing the minimal nonnegative solution of an irreducible singular M-matrix algebraic Riccati equation (MARE) in the noncritical case or a nonsingular MARE, but ADDA is only linearly convergent in the critical case. The drawback can be overcome by deflating techniques for an irreducible singular MARE so that the speed of quadratic convergence is still preserved in the critical case and accelerated in the noncritical case. In this paper, we proposed an improved deflating technique to accelerate further the convergence speed – the double deflating technique for an irreducible singular MARE in the critical case. We proved that ADDA is quadratically convergent instead of linearly when it is applied to the deflated algebraic Riccati equation (ARE) obtained by a double deflating technique. We also showed that the double deflating technique is better than the deflating technique from the perspective of dimension of the deflated ARE. Numerical experiments are provided to illustrate that our double deflating technique is effective.     

Ill-posedness of the Camassa–Holm and related equations in the critical space

We prove norm inflation and hence ill-posedness for a class of shallow water wave equations, such as the Camassa–Holm equation, Degasperis–Procesi equation and Novikov equation etc., in the critical Sobolev space $H^{3/2}$ and even in the Besov space $B_{p,r}^{1+1/p}$ for $p\in [1,\infty ],r\in (1,\infty ]$. Our results cover both real-line and torus cases (only real-line case for Novikov), solving an open problem left in the previous works ([5], [14], [16]).     

Characterization of intrinsic ultracontractivity for one dimensional Schrödinger operators

We consider a Schrödinger operator $L=?d^2/d{x}^2+V(x)$ on $\mathbb{R}$, where V is a real-valued measurable function, and give an explicit and simple characterization of intrinsic ultracontractivity (IU) of the Schrödinger semigroup generated by L for a wide class of potentials. By making use of it, we also give new examples of potentials for which the semigroups satisfy (IU) or non-(IU).     

Explicit estimates of sums related to the Nyman–Beurling criterion for the Riemann Hypothesis

We give an estimate for sums appearing in the Nyman–Beurling criterion for the Riemann Hypothesis. These sums contain the Möbius function and are related to the imaginary part of the Estermann zeta function. The estimate is remarkably sharp in comparison to other sums containing the Möbius function. The bound is smaller than the trivial bound – essentially the number of terms – by a fixed power of that number. The exponent is made explicit. The methods intensively use tools from the theory of continued fractions and from the theory of Fourier series.     

Convergence of solutions for the fractional Cahn–Hilliard system

This paper deals with the Cauchy–Dirichlet problem for the fractional Cahn–Hilliard equation. The main results consist of global (in time) existence of weak solutions, characterization of parabolic smoothing effects (implying under proper condition eventual boundedness of trajectories), and convergence of each solution to a (single) equilibrium. In particular, to prove the convergence result, a variant of the so-called ?ojasiewicz–Simon inequality is provided for the fractional Dirichlet Laplacian and (possibly) non-analytic (but $C^1$) nonlinearities.