Photoinduced charge separation reactions of J-aggregates coated on silver nanoparticles

The photochemistry of cyanine J-aggregates on the surface of colloidal Ag nanoparticles is reported. The photochemistry is initiated through ultrafast photoexcitation of the plasmon band in Ag nanoparticles, producing an enhanced near-field that interacts with the J-aggregate monolayer. Through transient absorption spectroscopy, we show that photoexcitation of the plasmon in Ag nanoparticles leads to exciton dynamics that differ strongly from J-aggregates alone or for J-aggregate monolayers on bulk metal surfaces. Specifically, charge-separated states with a lifetime of approximately 300 ps between the J-aggregate and Ag colloid are formed. The reduction of the Ag nanoparticles is shown to be a multielectron process.     

The existence of a positive solution for nonlinear fractional differential equations with integral boundary value conditions

In this paper, first, we consider the existence of a positive solution for the nonlinear fractional differential equation boundary value problem where 0≤λ < 1,^CD^α is the Caputo's differential operator of order α, and f:[0,1] × [0,∞)→[0,∞) is a continuous function. Using some cone theoretic techniques, we deduce a general existence theorem for this problem. Then, we consider two following more general problems for arbitrary α, 1≤n < α≤n + 1: Problem 1: where , 0≤λ < k + 1; Problem 2: where 0≤λ≤α and D^α is the Riemann–Liouville fractional derivative of order α. For these problems, we give existence results, which improve recent results in the literature. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Spectrophotometric determination of urea in dermatologic formulations and cosmetics

A rapid, relatively sensitive, and low-cost method for the determination of water-soluble urea content in dermatological therapy products and cosmetics is proposed using a new spectrophotometric assay with water as the only extraction solvent. Spectrophotometric methods involve addition of a known excess of bromate to urea in an acid medium, followed by the determination of residual bromine and chlorine reacting with methyl orange and measurement of absorbance at 505 nm. The absorbance increases linearly with urea concentration (r = 0.9998). The systems obey Beer's law for 6 - 90 microg ml(-1). The calculated apparent molar absorbance values are found to be 4.537 x 10(3) dm(3) mol(-1) cm(-1) and the Sandell's sensitivity is 0.013 microg cm(-2). The variables affecting the rate of the reaction were investigated. The relative standard deviation for five-replication determination of 60 microg ml(-1) urea was 2.1% and the detection limit of the method is 0.34 ng ml(-1).     

Virtual atomic and molecular data centre

The Virtual Atomic and Molecular Data Centre (VAMDC, http://www.vamdc.eu) is a European Union funded collaboration between groups involved in the generation, evaluation, and use of atomic and molecular data. VAMDC aims to build a secure, documented, flexible and interoperable e-science environment-based interface to existing atomic and molecular data. The project will cover establishing the core consortium, the development and deployment of the infrastructure and the development of interfaces to the existing atomic and molecular databases. It will also provide a forum for training potential users and dissemination of expertise worldwide. This review describes the scope of the VAMDC project; it provides a survey of the atomic and molecular data sets that will be included plus a discussion of how they will be integrated. Some applications of these data are also discussed.     

Surface states of titanium dioxide nanoparticles modified with enediol ligands

Control of surface states of titanium dioxide nanoparticles using 2-(3,4-dihydroxyphenyl)ethylamine (dopamine) and 3,4-dihydrophenylacetic acid, which act as ligands to the undercoordinated surface sites (carrier traps), is demonstrated by electrochemical techniques. The deepest traps were found to be most reactive and are selectively removed by the addition of the ligands which enhances the kinetics of electron accumulation in the film. Furthermore, a shift in the Fermi level to more positive potentials was detected for electrodes modified with the negatively charged ligand (3,4-dihydrophenylacetic acid) compared to that of electrodes modified with the positively charged ligand (dopamine). The presence of the negative charge on the ligand also contributed to the underpotential of hydrogen evolution on 3,4-dihydrophenylacetic acid-modified electrodes.     

A variational coupled damage-plasticity model via gradient enhancement of the free energy function

We present a coupled damage-plasticity model, whose regularization is achieved through gradient enhancement of the free energy function by introducing new variables. They serve to transport the values of the inelastic variables across the element boundaries, and their gradients play regularisation role in the model. Variational formulation results in a pure minimisation problem, leading to model non-local in nature and preserving C⁰ interpolation order of the variables. Numerical examples illustrating the performance of the proposed model are presented. It is shown that the pathological mesh dependence is efficiently removed, together with the difficulties of numerical calculations in the softening range. (© 2009 Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)     

Reconstructive and displacive transformations of tectosilicates

By using the thermally induced phase transformation initial zeolites were converted into pure carnegieite, stuffed derivative of cristobalite. The polymorphs obtained from Na-LTA are stoichiometric (NaAlSiO₄), since those obtained from Na-FAU zeolite are non-stoichiometric (Na_1-xAl_1-xSi_1+xO₄). Stoichiometric carnegieite have cubic structure, while non-stoichiometric carnegieite crystallized in cubic and orthorhombic forms. ²⁹Si MAS NMR spectra show a very large but expecting difference between stoichiometric and non-stoichiometric carnegieite. The spectrum of stoichiometric carnegieite has only one peak Si(4Al), while the spectrum of non-stoichiometric carnegieite consist few superimposed peaks assigned to Si(4Al), Si(3Al), Si(2Al), Si(1Al) and Si(0Al). DTA study indicates the occurrence of displacive phase transition of all synthesized carnegieite. The transition temperature is depending on silicon aluminum order: T _m=690°C for stoichiometric, T _m=565 and 660°C for non-stoichiometric, low-temperature and high-temperature carnegieite, respectively. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Influence of spectral line broadening on the mode structure of He-Kr and He-Ar gas lasers

Using the semiclassical perturbation approach, Stark broadening parameters for Kr II 469.4 nm, Ar II 476.5 nm, and Ar II 480.6 nm spectral lines have been determined. The obtained results have been used for the investigation of the role of the Stark broadening mechanism on the mode properties of hollow cathode excited noble gas mixture lasers. It has been found that for the He-KrII 469.4 nm laser broadening by neutral atom collisions is large enough to explain the single-mode operation of this laser, as opposed to the He-ArII 476.5 nm laser where Stark broadening also has to be taken into account to explain this property. Published in Zhurnal Prikladnoi Spektroskopii, Vol. 73, No. 3, pp. 405–407, May–June, 2006.     

Assembly and charge transfer in hybrid TiO(2) architectures using biotin-avidin as a connector

Exploiting the presence of undercoordinated surface Ti atoms at the tips of TiO2 nanorods and the dopamine selectivity for these Ti surface states, biotin was conjugated to TiO2 nanocrystallites using dopamine as a bridging linker. Using abiotin-avidin complex as a connector the "tip-to-tip" assembly of 400 nm elongated TiO2 rods was obtained. The photoexcitation of avidin-TiO2 hybrids resulted in the transfer of holes from nanocrystallites to protein and consequent oxidation of avidin, most probably at tyrosine 33.