Fracture analysis of wheel hub fabricated from pressure die cast aluminum alloy

A catastrophic failure of wheel hub occurred during service. The nature of failure was a corner crack emanating from a spoke hole. An analytical investigation was carried out using the tool of Linear Elastic Fracture Mechanics to establish the cause of failure. The nonlinear behaviour is due to the presence of material inhomogeneities and micro-discontinuities. Plastic zone correction is made. The presence of material inhomogeneities and micro-discontinuities tend to alter the conditions near the crack tip. An analytical estimation was carried out in order to calculate the minimum number of cycles covered by the wheel hub in service.The initiation of crack growth is complex because of heterogeneity and morphology of the fracture surface. Fractographic and metallographic studies are carried out to assist the understanding of the corner cracking problem.     

Steady State of Stochastic Sandpile Models

We study the steady state of the Abelian sandpile models with stochastic toppling rules. The particle addition operators commute with each other, but in general these operators need not be diagonalizable. We use their Abelian algebra to determine their eigenvalues, and the Jordan block structure. These are then used to determine the probability of different configurations in the steady state. We illustrate this procedure by explicitly determining the numerically exact steady state for a one dimensional example, for systems of size ≤12, and also study the density profile in the steady state.     

Synthesis and photophysical study of silver nanoparticles stabilized by unsaturated dicarboxylates

Solution-phase synthesis of nanometer-sized silver particles is reported by sodium borohydride reduction of AgNO_3. Two isomeric dicarboxylates (sodium maleate and sodium fumarate) have been used as stabilizing agents. The dicarboxylate-stabilized silver nanoparticles are characterized by UV-vis spectroscopy, high-resolution transmission electron microscopy (HR-TEM) and fourier transform infrared (FT-IR) spectroscopy. A qualitative comparison is made between the UV-vis spectral characteristic of the SPR band and the simulated curve obtained from modified Mie's theory. Silver nanoparticles prepared using these two isomeric dicarboxylates show intense fluorescence in the visible region. DFT with hybrid functional (B3LYP)-based frequency (IR) calculation of both the dicarboxylates and the respective nanoparticles are in good agreement with the experimental IR frequency. On the basis of this calculation a model has been proposed for the stabilization of silver nanoparticles by these two isomeric dicarboxylate anions.     

Triple minima in the free energy of semiflexible polymers

We study the free energy of the worm-like-chain model, in the constant-extension ensemble, as a function of the stiffness lambda for finite chains of length L. We find that the polymer properties obtained in this ensemble are qualitatively different from those obtained using constant-force ensembles. In particular, we find that as we change the stiffness parameter, t=L/lambda, the polymer makes a transition from the flexible to the rigid phase and there is an intermediate regime of parameter values where the free energy has three minima and both phases are stable. This leads to interesting features in the force-extension curves.     

Absolute configuration of crotsparine,crotsparinine and sparsiflorine

Absolute configurations of crotsparine, crotsparinine and sparsiflorine have been determined.     

HPLC method development and validation of cytotoxic agent phenyl‐heptatriyne in Bidens pilosa with ultrasonic‐assisted cloud point extraction and preconcentration

Extraction and pre‐concentration of a bioactive marker compound, phenyl‐1,3,5‐heptatriyne from Bidens pilosa, prior to HPLC has been demonstrated using both organic and ecofriendly solvents. Non‐ionic surfactants, viz. Triton X‐100, Triton X‐114 and Genapol X‐80, were used for extraction. No back‐extraction or liquid chromatographic steps were required to remove the target phytochemical from the surfactant‐rich extractant phase. The optimized cloud point extraction procedure has been shown to be a potentially useful methodology for the preconcentration of the target analyte, with a preconcentration factor of 4–99. Moreover, the method is simple, sensitive, rapid and consumes lesser solvent than traditional methods. An isocratic chromatographic separation and quantitation was accomplished on a C₁₈ column with acetonitrile–acidified aqueous as mobile phase at a flow rate of 1.0 mL/min, UV detection at 254 nm and specificity with photo diode‐array detector (PDA) and MS. Under the optimum experimental conditions recovery was satisfactory (99.18–100.33%) without interference from the surfactant. The method seems to be reliable with intraday precision and interday precision below 2.0%. Good linearity was obtained in the working range from 7.5 to 30 µg/mL with correlation coefficient >0.99. The limits of detection and quantitation were 1.84 and 6.13 µg/mL, respectively. The method was validated following international guidelines and successfully applied for quantitative assays of cytotoxic compound phenyl‐1,3,5‐heptatriyne in Bidens pilosa. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Bromodimethylsulfonium bromide (BDMS): a useful reagent for conversion of aldoximes and primary amides to nitriles

An operationally simple and high yielding procedure has been developed for the preparation of nitriles from aldoximes and primary amides using bromodimethylsulfonium bromide (BDMS) as a novel and efficient reagent in the absence of any added base or catalyst. The optimal protocol is applicable to access a wide range of cyano compounds including aromatic, heterocyclic, and aliphatic species. The conversion of aldoximes to nitriles takes place at room temperature in acetonitrile, whereas acetonitrile at reflux temperature is required for rapid conversion in the case of primary amides.     

Studien über Adsorption. VI

Ohne Zusammenfassung Deutsch von K. Popp (Leipzig).