Effect of various surfactants on stability and thermophysical properties of nanofluids

Journal of Thermal Analysis and Calorimetry - The effect of Fe3O4 nanoparticles and carbon nanotubes (CNTs) on the viscosity of a nanofluid is experimentally investigated from 278 to 313 K...     

Tailored side‐chain architecture of benzil voltage stabilizers for enhanced dielectric strength of cross‐linked polyethylene

The synthesis and physico‐chemical properties of seven benzil‐type voltage stabilizers are reported. The benzil core is substituted with alkyl chains of different length that are linked to the benzil core via an ester, ether, or tertiary amine group. All additives can be melt‐processed with low‐density polyethylene (LDPE). Fourier‐transform infrared spectroscopy confirms that benzil compounds are not affected by the LDPE cross‐linking reaction induced by dicumyl peroxide. Moreover, a combination of gel content measurements, thermal analysis, and small‐angle X‐ray scattering indicates that the presence of benzil voltage stabilizers does not significantly alter the microstructure of cross‐linked polyethylene (XLPE). Electrical tree inhibition experiments under high‐voltage alternating current conditions show that all investigated additives substantially enhance the dielectric strength of the insulating material at a concentration of only 10 mmol kg^?1. The highest improvement in dielectric strength, of more than 70% with respect to reference XLPE, is obtained with voltage stabilizers, which carry short (methyl) side chains that are linked to the benzil core via an ester or tertiary amine group. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Polym. Sci., Part B: Polym. Phys. 2014 , 52, 1047–1054     

Scalable Synthesis of Piperazines Enabled by Visible‐Light Irradiation and Aluminum Organometallics

The development of more active C? H oxidation catalysts has inspired a rapid, scalable, and stereoselective assembly of multifunctional piperazines through a [3+3] coupling of azomethine ylides. A combination of visible‐light irradiation and aluminum organometallics is essential to promote this transformation, which introduces visible‐light photochemistry of main‐group organometallics and sets the basis for new and promising catalysts.     

The Quest for Polysulfides in Lithium–Sulfur Battery Electrolytes: An Operando Confocal Raman Spectroscopy Study

Confocal Raman spectra of a lithium–sulfur battery electrolyte are recorded operando in a depth‐of‐discharge resolved manner for an electrochemical cell with a realistic electrolyte/sulfur loading ratio. The evolution of various possible polysulfides is unambiguously identified by combining Raman spectroscopy data with DFT simulations.     

On random k‐out subgraphs of large graphs

We consider random subgraphs of a fixed graph with large minimum degree. We fix a positive integer k and let G_k be the random subgraph where each independently chooses k random neighbors, making kn edges in all. When the minimum degree then G_k is k‐connected w.h.p. for ; Hamiltonian for k sufficiently large. When , then G_k has a cycle of length for . By w.h.p. we mean that the probability of non‐occurrence can be bounded by a function (or ) where . © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Random Struct. Alg., 50, 143–157, 2017     

Constructive cooperative coevolution for large-scale global optimisation

This paper presents the Constructive Cooperative Coevolutionary (\(\mathrm {C}^3\)) algorithm, applied to continuous large-scale global optimisation problems. The novelty of \(\mathrm {C}^3\) is that it utilises a multi-start architecture and incorporates the Cooperative Coevolutionary algorithm. The considered optimisation problem is decomposed into subproblems. An embedded optimisation algorithm optimises the subproblems separately while exchanging information to co-adapt the solutions for the subproblems. Further, \(\mathrm {C}^3\) includes a novel constructive heuristic that generates different feasible solutions for the entire problem and thereby expedites the search. In this work, two different versions of \(\mathrm {C}^3\) are evaluated on high-dimensional benchmark problems, including the CEC’2013 test suite for large-scale global optimisation. \(\mathrm {C}^3\) is compared with several state-of-the-art algorithms, which shows that \(\mathrm {C}^3\) is among the most competitive algorithms. \(\mathrm {C}^3\) outperforms the other algorithms for most partially separable functions and overlapping functions. This shows that \(\mathrm {C}^3\) is an effective algorithm for large-scale global optimisation. This paper demonstrates the enhanced performance by using constructive heuristics for generating initial feasible solutions for Cooperative Coevolutionary algorithms in a multi-start framework.