Stability-Indicating Densitometric HPTLC Method for Qualitative and Quantitative Analysis of Hydroquinone in Commercial Whitening Creams

JPC – Journal of Planar Chromatography – Modern TLC - A densitometric high-performance thin-layer chromatographic (HPTLC) method for analysis of hydroquinone has been developed and...     

直觉Menger空间中的广义压缩映射原理及其在微分方程中的应用

利用Atanassov的思路,将直觉Menger空间定义为由Menger提出的Menger空间的自然推广.同时也得出一个新广义压缩映射,并运用该压缩映射证明了直觉Menger空间中微分方程解的存在性定理.     

Shear deformation plate continua of large double layered space structures

A simple method is presented to model large rigid-jointed lattice structures as continuous elastic media with couple stresses using energy equivalence. In our analysis the transition from the discrete system to the continuous media is achieved by expanding the displacements and the rotations of the nodal points in a Taylor series about a suitable chosen origin. The strain energy of the continuous media with couple stresses is then specialized to obtain shear deformation plate continua. Equivalent continua for single layered grids, double layered grids and three-dimensional lattices are then obtained.     

Stochastic upscaling of random microstructures

In this work we present an upscaling technique for multi-scale computations based on random microstructures modelled as realisations of lognormally distributed random fields, or described by randomly distributed inclusions in a homogeneous matrix. Their corresponding coarse-scale model parameters are considered as uncertain, and are approximated by random variables, the distributions of which are obtained via polynomial chaos based Bayesian procedures in which the fine-scale energy is used as an observation. (© 2017 Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)     

Ligand exchange chromatography: a vital dimension for the reliable characterization of heterocycles in crude oils and refined products

In the present study, we established a statistical distribution pattern of indigenous sulfur, nitrogen, and oxygen species in Arabian Heavy crude oil and its distilled fractions: naphtha, gas oil, and vacuum gas oil (VGO) using chemical derivatization with methyl iodide and subsequent characterization by positive electrospray Fourier transform mass spectrometry. It was observed that sulfur species for naphtha and gas oil were accumulated at lower double bond equivalent values and at lower carbon numbers compared to VGO, whereas crude oil encompassed a complete range of the sulfur species detected in all distilled fractions. Moreover, the use of alumina column chromatography and ligand exchange chromatography (LEC) on a palladium-bonded silica stationary phase revealed additional structural features of sulfur heterocycles in terms of condensed and non-condensed thiophenes. During LEC separation, in addition to sulfur heterocycles, interesting results were obtained for oxygen-containing compounds. Ortho-substituted alkyl phenols were separated from meta- and para-substituted alkyl phenols on a palladium-bonded silica stationary phase.     

Dual and tetraelectrode QCMs using imprinted polymers as receptors for ions and neutral analytes

Polymers as coating materials were combined with quartz crystal microbalances (QCMs) to design sensor devices for the detection of both ionic and neutral analytes in liquid phase. The design and geometry of dual and tetraelectrode QCMs have been optimized to reduce electric field interferences. An unusual Sauerbrey effect was observed while exposing potassium salt solution to 10- and 20-MHz QCMs, i.e. increase in the frequency shifts by a factor of seven, which is attributed to electro-acoustic phenomena. Non-functionalized sol-gel materials were synthesized by templating with hydrophobic salt such as tetraethyl ammonium picrate. Imprinting with these ions of low charge density leads to sensitive layers, and UV–Vis spectroscopy was used to check re-inclusion of this analyte. In the next strategy, functionalized polyurethane for potassium ions and sol-gel materials with aminopropyl group as ligand were generated to tune selectivity and sensitivity towards Ni²⁺ and Cu²⁺. Methacrylic acid polymers were optimized for the detection of atrazine by hydrogen bonding; double molecular imprinted polyurethane approach was followed for pyrene recognition. Finally, these imprinted polymers were combined with tetraelectrode QCM to develop sensor platform.     

Mathematical modeling on the effect of equivalence ratio in emission characteristics of compression ignition engine with hydrogen substitution

The investigation presented in this paper concerns on the computational simulation of emissions characteristics in compression ignition engine with hydrogen substitution. Combustion process has been modeled based on Equilibrium Constants Method (ECM) with MATLAB program to calculate the mole fractions of 18 combustion products when hydrogen is burnt along with diesel fuel at variable equivalence ratios. It can be observed that hydrogen substitution causes significant increase in NH₃, H₂, atom H emissions during rich combustion and OH, NO₂, HNO₃ emissions during lean combustion. As the equivalence ratio increases during rich combustion, mole fractions of HCN, CH₄, CO and atom C decreases with increment of hydrogen substitution. N₂, atom N and CO₂ emissions decrease whereas no significant changes in O₂, NO, O₃ and atom O emissions throughout all equivalence ratios as hydrogen is added to the combustion.     

Quasi-Newton methods in infinite-dimensional spaces and application to matrix equations

In the first part of this paper, we give a survey on convergence rates analysis of quasi-Newton methods in infinite Hilbert spaces for nonlinear equations. Then, in the second part we apply quasi-Newton methods in their Hilbert formulation to solve matrix equations. So, we prove, under natural assumptions, that quasi-Newton methods converge locally and superlinearly; the global convergence is also studied. For numerical calculations, we propose new formulations of these methods based on the matrix representation of the dyadic operator and the vectorization of matrices. Finally, we apply our results to algebraic Riccati equations.     

Phytochemical and cytotoxic investigations of Curcuma mangga rhizomes

Investigations on the cytotoxic effects of the crude methanol and fractionated extracts (hexane, ethyl acetate) C. mangga against six human cancer cell lines, namely the hormone-dependent breast cell line (MCF-7), nasopharyngeal epidermoid cell line (KB), lung cell line (A549), cervical cell line (Ca Ski), colon cell lines (HCT 116 and HT-29), and one non-cancer human fibroblast cell line (MRC-5) were conducted using an in-vitro neutral red cytotoxicity assay. The crude methanol and fractionated extracts (hexane and ethyl acetate) displayed good cytotoxic effects against MCF-7, KB, A549, Ca Ski and HT-29 cell lines, but exerted no damage on the MRC-5 line. Chemical investigation from the hexane and ethyl acetate fractions resulted in the isolation of seven pure compounds, namely (E)-labda-8(17),12-dien-15,16-dial (1), (E)-15,16-bisnor-labda-8(17),11-dien-13-on (2), zerumin A (3), β-sitosterol, curcumin, demethoxycurcumin and bis-demethoxycurcumin. Compounds 1 and 3 exhibited high cytotoxic effects against all six selected cancer cell lines, while compounds 2 showed no anti-proliferative activity on the tested cell lines. Compound 1 also demonstrated strong cytotoxicity against the normal cell line MRC-5. This paper reports for the first time the cytotoxic activities of C. mangga extracts on KB, A549, Ca Ski, HT-29 and MRC-5, and the occurrence of compound 2 and 3 in C. mangga.     

Photo- and Electro-Production of a New Light Boson

In GSI experiments, a light pseudoscalar boson of mass Φ 1.6 MeV may have been observed. In order to examine this possibility from a different aspect we propose to study the photo-and electro-production process of Φ-particles. We calculate the cross section of neutral and charged Φ-particles. We examine the possible role of these production mechanisms in the heavy ion collision processes.