Significance of the HO2 + CO reaction during the combustion of CO + H2 mixtures at high pressures

This paper constitutes an experimental and numerical study, using uncertainty analysis of the most important parameters, to evaluate the mechanism for the combustion of CO + H₂ mixtures at high pressures in the range 15-50 bar and temperatures from 950 to 1100 K. Experiments were performed in a rapid compression machine. Autoignition delays were measured for stoichiometric compositions of CO + H₂ containing between 0 and 80% CO in the total fuel mixture. The experimental results showed an unequivocal monotonic increase as the proportion of CO in the mixture was raised. Comparisons were made also with the measured ignition delays in mixtures of H₂ with increasing dilution by N₂, corresponding to the proportions of CO present. These times also increased monotonically, albeit with a greater sensitivity to the extent of dilution than those measured in the CO + H₂ mixtures. By contrast, numerical simulations for the same mixtures, based on a kinetic model derived by Davis et al. displayed a qualitative discrepancy as there was virtually no sensitivity of the ignition delay to the changing ratio of CO + H₂, certainly up to 80% replacement. No exceptions to this trend were found, despite tests being made using seven other kinetic models for CO + H₂ combustion. Global uncertainty analyses were then applied to the Davis et al. model in order to trace the origins of this discrepancy. The analyses took into account the uncertainties in all rate parameters in the model, which is a pre-requisite for evaluation against ignition delay data. It is shown that the reaction rate constant recommended by Baulch et al. for the HO₂ + CO reaction, at T ∼ 1000 K, could be up to a factor of 10 too high and that lowering this rate corrected the qualitative anomaly between experiment and numerical prediction.     

How short-range attractions impact the structural order, self-diffusivity, and viscosity of a fluid

We present molecular simulation data for viscosity, self-diffusivity, and the local structural ordering of (i) a hard-sphere fluid and (ii) a square-well fluid with short-range attractions. The latter fluid exhibits a region of dynamic anomalies in its phase diagram, where its mobility increases upon isochoric cooling, which is found to be a subset of a larger region of structural anomalies, in which its pair correlations strengthen upon isochoric heating. This "cascade of anomalies" qualitatively resembles that found in recent simulations of liquid water. The results for the hard-sphere and square-well systems also show that the breakdown of the Stokes-Einstein relation upon supercooling occurs for conditions where viscosity and self-diffusivity develop different couplings to the degree of pairwise structural ordering of the liquid. We discuss how these couplings reflect dynamic heterogeneities. Finally, we note that the simulation data suggest how repulsive and attractive glasses may generally be characterized by two distinct levels of short-range structural order.     

A dual-catalysis approach to the asymmetric Steglich rearrangement and catalytic enantioselective addition of O-acylated azlactones to isoquinolines

A dual-catalysis approach, namely the combination of an achiral nucleophilic catalyst and a chiral anion-binding catalyst, was applied to the Steglich rearrangement to provide α,α-disubstituted amino acid derivatives in a highly enantioselective fashion. Replacement of the nucleophilic co-catalyst for isoquinoline resulted in a divergent reaction pathway and an unprecedented transformation of O-acylated azlactones. This strategy provided highly substituted α,β-diamino acid derivatives with excellent levels of stereocontrol.     

B-splines methods with redefined basis functions for solving fourth order parabolic partial differential equations

In this work, we discuss two methods for solving a fourth order parabolic partial differential equation. In Method-I, we decompose the given equation into a system of second order equations and solve them by using cubic B-spline method with redefined basis functions. In Method-II, the equation is solved directly by applying quintic B-spline method with redefined basis functions. Stability of these methods have been discussed. Both methods are unconditionally stable. These methods are tested on four examples. The computed results are compared wherever possible with those already available in literature. We have developed Method-I for fourth order non homogeneous parabolic partial differential equation from which we can obtain displacement and bending moment both simultaneously, while Method-II gives only displacement. The results show that the derived methods are easily implemented and approximate the exact solution very well.     

Physical properties,crystal and magnetic structure of layered Fe<Subscript>1.11</Subscript>Te<Subscript>1-</Subscript><Subscript><Emphasis Type="Italic">x</Emphasis></Subscript>Se<Subscript><Emphasis Type="Italic">x</Emphasis></Subscript> superconductors

The physical and structural properties of Fe_1.11Te and Fe_1.11Te_0.5Se_0.5 have been investigated by means of X-ray and neutron diffraction as well as physical property measurements. For the Fe_1.11Te compound, the structure distortion from a tetragonal to monoclinic phase takes place at 64 K accompanied with the onset of antiferromagnetic order upon cooling. The magnetic structure of the monoclinic phase was confirmed to be of antiferromagnetic configuration with a propagation vector k = (1/2, 0, 1/2) based on Rietveld refinement of neutron powder diffraction data. The structural/magnetic transitions are also clearly visible in magnetic, electronic and thermodynamic measurements. For superconducting Fe_1.11Te_0.5Se_0.5 compound, the superconducting transition with T _c = 13.4 K is observed in the resistivity and ac susceptibility measurements. The upper critical field H _c2 is obtained by measuring the resistivity under different magnetic fields. The Kim’s critical state model is adopted to analyze the temperature dependence of the ac susceptibility and the intergranular critical current density is calculated as a function of both field amplitude and temperature. Neutron diffraction results show that Fe_1.11Te_0.5Se_0.5 crystalizes in tetragonal structure at 300 K as in the parent compound Fe_1.11Te and no structural distortion is detected upon cooling to 2 K. However an anisotropic thermal expansion anomaly is observed around 100 K.     

Photo-neutron cross-section of 100Mo

The ¹⁰⁰Mo(γ, n) reaction cross-section was experimentally determined at end point bremsstrahlung energy of 10 and 12.5 MeV using off-line γ-ray spectrometric technique. It was also found that ¹⁰⁰Mo(γ, n) reaction cross-section increases sharply from the end point bremsstrahlung energy of 10 MeV to 12.5 MeV, which may be because of GDR around the energy region of 12–16 MeV. The ¹⁰⁰Mo(γ, n) reaction cross-section as a function of photon energy was calculated theoretically using TALYS 1.2 computer code. The flux-weighted average values of ¹⁰⁰Mo(γ, n) reaction cross-section for bremsstrahlung having end point energy of 10 and 12.5 MeV were also calculated using the experimental and theoretical data of mono-energetic photon. The present experimental ¹⁰⁰Mo(γ, n) reaction cross-sections were compared with the bremsstrahlung flux-weighted average values of experimental and theoretical data and found to be in the lower side for 10 MeV and in the higher side for 12.5 MeV.     

A Sharp-Interface Immersed Boundary Method with Improved Mass Conservation and Reduced Spurious Pressure Oscillations

A method for reducing the spurious pressure oscillations observed when simulating moving boundary flow problems with sharp-interface immersed boundary methods (IBMs) is proposed. By first identifying the primary cause of these oscillations to be the violation of the geometric conservation law near the immersed boundary, we adopt a cut-cell based approach to strictly enforce geometric conservation. In order to limit the complexity associated with the cut-cell method, the cut-cell based discretization is limited only to the pressure Poisson and velocity correction equations in the fractional-step method and the small-cell problem tackled by introducing a virtual cell-merging technique. The method is shown to retain all the desirable properties of the original finite-difference based IBM while at the same time, reducing pressure oscillations for moving boundaries by roughly an order of magnitude.     

Molecular Weight Distributions of Polymer Solutions: Combination of Field Flow Fractionation (FFF) and Analytical Ultracentrifugation (AUC)

Molecular weight, distribution, as well as other molecular characteristics are important drivers in determining the potential behaviors and hence applications of polymeric materials. Out of different methods available for the determination of molecular weight and its distribution, field flow fractionation (FFF) provides absolute molecular weight values and accurate molecular weight distributions. Analytical ultracentrifugation (AUC), on the other hand, relies on the exact density of the polymer materials in solution to determine the accurate molecular weight and its distribution and in the absence of knowledge of exact density, AUC is less accurate than the FFF method. However, combination of the two methods can be achieved to gain insights into the other molecular characteristics of swollen polymer chains. One such example is the determination of the exact density of the swollen polymer chains by the incorporation of the molecular weight information from FFF into AUC analysis. Based on the comparison of the optimized polymer chain density with the bulk density, it was observed that the polyacrylic acid and polyacrylamide chains were swollen in the range of 27 to 29%. Moreover, the FFF and AUC can also complement each other in enhancing the range of characterization possible with the two methods when used separately.     

Synthesis and Biological Activity of Some Novel O-Phosphorylated Benzoxazole Derivatives

The phosphorylation of 2-(2′-hydroxyphenyl) benzoxazole has been accomplished with phosphorus oxychloride in a 1:1, 2:1, and 3:1 molar ratio in the presence of a base to yield O-phosphorylated benzoxazole derivatives. Their structures were confirmed by elemental analyses and IR, ¹H NMR, and ³¹P NMR spectral studies. These compounds have been screened for their insecticidal activity against Periplenata americana and were found to be quite active in this respect.