A Similarity Solution for Oil Lens Redistribution Including Capillary Forces and Oil Entrapment

Redistribution of a LNAPL lens (oil) at the phreatic surface is described using a multi-phase flow model, with emphasis on the effect of oil entrapment by water. The flow process is analyzed under the assumption that the vertical capillary and gravitational forces balance. Vertical integration leads to explicit functions which approximate the relations between the free oil volume per unit lateral area and the vertically averaged oil relative permeability on the one hand and the vertical position of the interface between zones with either two or three phases on the other hand. A linear relation between the trapped and free oil volume per unit lateral area approximates the vertically integrated nonlinear expression for the trapped oil saturation. The resulting differential equation admits a similarity solution describing the lateral spreading of free oil and the amount and location of trapped oil. Comparison with illustrative numerical computations, which are based on the nonreduced flow model in a two-dimensional planar or axisymmetric domain, shows that the analytical solution provides a good approximation of the free oil distribution at all later times.     

Plasmonic Scissors for Molecular Design

Heterogeneous catalysts play an important role in surface catalytic reactions, but selective bond breaking and control of reaction products in catalytic processes remain significant challenges. High‐vacuum tip‐enhanced Raman spectroscopy (HV‐TERS) is one of the best candidates to realize surface catalytic reactions. Herein, HV‐TERS was employed in a new method to control dissociation by using hot electrons, generated from plasmon decay, as plasmonic scissors. In this method, the N?N bond in 4,4′‐dimercaptoazobenzene was selectively dissociated by plasmonic scissors, and the reaction products formed from the radical fragment (SC₆H₅N) were controlled by varying the pH value. Under acidic conditions, p‐aminothiophenol was produced from the radical fragment by attachment of hydrogen ions, whereas under alkaline conditions, 4‐nitrobenzenethiol was obtained by attachment of oxygen ions to the substrate.     

Simultaneous serum desalting and total protein determination by macroporous reversed-phase chromatography

Macroporous reversed-phase (mRP) chromatography was successfully used to develop an accurate and precise method for total protein in serum. The limits of detection (0.83 μg, LOD) and quantification (2.51 μg, LOQ) for the mRP method are comparable with those of the widely used micro BCA protein assay. The mRP method can be used to determine the total protein concentration across a wide dynamic range by detecting chromatographic peaks at 215 nm and 280 nm. The method has the added advantage of desalting and denaturing proteins, leading to more complete digestion by trypsin and to better LC–MS–MS identification in shotgun proteomics experiments.

The Reduction and Nitration of 1-Keto and 4-Keto-1,2,3,4-Tetrahydrophenanthrene

The reduction and nitration of 1-keto and 4-keto-1,2,3,4-tetrahydrophenanthrene were investigated. The structures of the products were confirmed by spectroscopic data.     

Chemical and mechanical stability of EPDM in a PEM fuel cell environment

Proton exchange membrane (PEM) fuel cell stack requires elastomeric gaskets in each cell to keep the reactant gases within their respective regions. Long-term durability of the fuel cell stacks depends heavily on the functionality of the elastomeric gasket material. Chemical and mechanical stability of the elastomeric material is of great concern to the overall performance of the fuel cell stacks. The degradation of a commercially available gasket material, ethylene-propylene-diene monomer (EPDM), was investigated in a simulated PEM fuel cell environment in this work. One solution and two temperatures, based on actual fuel cell operation, were used in this study. Optical microscopy was used to show the topographical changes on the sample surface. Attenuated total reflection Fourier transform infrared (ATR-FTIR) spectroscopy was employed to study the surface chemistry of the gasket material before and after exposure to the simulated PEM fuel cell environment over time. Atomic absorption spectrometry was used to identify the leachants in the soaking solution from the elastomeric material. Microindentation test and dynamic mechanical analysis (DMA) were conducted to assess the change of mechanical properties of the samples exposed to the environment. The atomic absorption spectrometer analysis shows that silicon and calcium were leached from the material into the soaking solution. The ATR-FTIR results indicate that the chemical changes were not apparent. The microindentation test and DMA results reveal that mechanical properties were not changed significantly.     

Frequency-agile,rapid scanning spectroscopy: absorption sensitivity of 2 × 10−12 cm−1 Hz−1/2 with a tunable diode laser

We present ultrasensitive measurements of molecular absorption using frequency-agile rapid scanning, cavity ring-down spectroscopy with an external-cavity diode laser. A microwave source that drives an electro-optic phase modulator with a bandwidth of 20 GHz generates pairs of sidebands on the probe laser. The optical cavity provides for high sensitivity and filters the carrier and all but a single, selected sideband. Absorption spectra were acquired by stepping the tunable sideband from mode-to-mode of the ring-down cavity at a rate that was limited only by the cavity decay time. This approach allows for scanning rates of 8 kHz per cavity resonance, a minimum detectable absorption coefficient of 1.7 × 10^?11 cm^?1 after only 20 ms of averaging, and a noise-equivalent absorption coefficient of 1.7 × 10^?12 cm^?1 Hz^?1/2. By comparison with cavity-enhanced laser absorption spectrometers reported in the literature, the present system is, to the best of our knowledge, among the most sensitive and has by far the highest spectrum scanning rate.     

Neutral currents and stellar cooling

If weak neutral currents couple with the strengths suggested by recent experiments, then stellar cooling via neutrino pair emission from thermally excited nuclear states may be significant in white dwarfs with central temperature ?10^8° K. At higher temperatures, other neutrino cooling processes are more important. In the sun, the decay of thermally excited ⁵⁷Fe nuclei may produce a moderately large, but probably unobservable, low-energy flux of ν_μ, $\text{g}\text{?}\text{n}{}_{\mathrm{\mu }}$, ν_e, and $\text{g}\text{?}\text{n}{}_{\mathrm{e}}$ neutrinos.     

Discrete flavor symmetries and a formula for the cabibbo angle

A discrete flavor symmetry is proposed which leads to the relation tan²θ_c = m_d/m_s. The symmetry may be implemented in weak interaction models where the breakdown of parity is spontaneous.     

Spin and statistics of solitons andJ-Homomorphism

The deep connection between the spin and statistics of solitons and homotopy groups is clarified by usingJ-Homomorphism.