Sonochemical synthesis of cerium oxide nanoparticles-effect of additives and quantum size effect

Cerium oxide (CeO(2)) nanoparticles were prepared sonochemically, by using cerium nitrate and azodicarbonamide as starting materials, and ethylenediamine or tetraalkylammonium hydroxide as additives. The additives have a strong effect on the particle size and particle size distribution. CeO(2) nanoparticles with small particle size and narrow particle size distribution are obtained with the addition of additives; while highly agglomerated CeO(2) nanoparticles are obtained in the absence of additives. Monodispersed CeO(2) nanoparticles with a mean particle size of ca. 3.3 nm are obtained when tetramethylammonium hydroxide (TMAOH) is used as the additive and the molar ratio of cerium nitrate/azodicarbonamine/TMAOH is 1/1/1. Blue shifts of the absorption peak and the absorption edges of the products are observed in the UV-Vis absorption spectra as a result of the quantum size effect. The samples have been characterized using powder XRD, TEM, DLS, and absorption spectra.     

H-bonded clusters in the trimethylamine/water system: a matrix isolation and computational study

The environmentally important interaction products of trimethylamine (TMA) and water molecules have been observed by Matrix Isolation Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (MIS-FTIR). Infrared spectra of solid argon matrix layers, in which both TMA and H(2)O molecules were entrapped as impurities, were analyzed for bands in the ν(O-H) region, not seen in matrix layers containing either of the parent molecules alone. Results were interpreted on the basis of the emergence of several spectral band pairs and their red shifts from the position of the matrix isolated H(2)O monomers as compared to semiempirically scaled frequencies from the B3LYP/aug-cc-pVTZ calculations and empirical correlations with a large body of data on H-bonded complexes. Bands were assigned to a complex cluster of two TMA molecules flanking a closed ring of four H-bonded H(2)O molecules. The formation of this cluster is argued to be formed in the vapor phase (as opposed to being a result of diffusion of the trapped species) and is related to its large stabilization energy (enthalpy) because of strong cooperative effects in its H-bond system.     

A combined matrix isolation and ab initio study of bromine oxides

Bromine oxides have been generated by passing a mixture of Br(2)/O(2)/Ar through a microwave discharge. The products were stabilized at 6.5 K in an excess amount of argon. Infrared spectroscopy was used to analyze the species formed; experiments with enriched (18)O(2) and ab initio calculations were carried out to assist in the assignment of the spectra. Besides the known species BrO, OBrO, and BrBrO, spectroscopic evidence for BrOBrO, BrBrO(2), and a new isomer of Br(2)O(3) is reported for the first time. Extensive comparisons are drawn between the present studies and previous experimental and theoretical works. The chemistry involved in the production of the observed compounds is discussed. The assignments are corroborated by the good correlation between observed and calculated band positions and intensities.     

Sonochemical coating of paper by microbiocidal silver nanoparticles

Colloidal silver has gained wide acceptance as an antimicrobial agent, and various substrates coated with nanosilver such as fabrics, plastics, and metal have been shown to develop antimicrobial properties. Here, a simple method to develop coating of colloidal silver on paper using ultrasonic radiation is presented, and the coatings are characterized using X-ray diffraction (XRD), high resolution scanning electron microscope (HRSEM), and thermogravimetry (TGA) measurements. Depending on the variables such as precursor concentrations and ultrasonication time, uniform coatings ranging from 90 to 150 nm in thickness have been achieved. Focused ion beam (FIB) cross section imaging measurements revealed that silver nanoparticles penetrated the paper surface to a depth of more than 1 μm, resulting in highly stable coatings. The coated paper demonstrated antibacterial activity against E. coli and S. aureus, suggesting its potential application as a food packing material for longer shelf life.     

About comparison of combination of different laser beams at a target to the performance of an equivalent single laser

In this work, it is shown that different lasers’ beams, of the same frequency, having, however, randomly different phases and polarizations at the output, combine at a target by a statistical distribution with a mean and a standard deviation, both, of the same order of magnitude as the incoherent sum of their intensities. This disadvantage does not occur in an “equivalent” single laser operation. Therefore, it delivers a much higher intensity at the target.     

Minimization of the pulse's timing jitter in a dispersion-compensated WDM system

We address the problem of the collision-induced crosstalk between pulses in a dispersion-compensated WDM system composed of a periodic array of cells that include two or three fiber segments. Both the cross- and self-phase-modulation nonlinearities are taken into account. A semi-analytical approximation and direct simulations are used to calculate the frequency shift (FS) of colliding pulses, and to search for conditions which provide for minima of the FS and the temporal shift (TS), including the most promising possibility of minimizing both shifts simultaneously. Semi-analytical results, obtained by means of the perturbation theory, are in qualitative agreement with the numerical findings, especially in regimes near the optimum. In searching for the FS and TS minima, we investigate the effect of changing the initial width and chirp of the pulse, position of the amplifier within the dispersion–compensation period, group-velocity difference between the channels, allocation of the group-velocity-dispersion (GVD) inside the cell, and the average GVD. We conclude that a more sophisticated dispersion–compensation map, with three different local values of GVD, may be significantly more efficient than the one based on two different segments. A global FS minimum, with respect to the variation of all the parameters, is found.     

Global minimization by reducing the duality gap

We derive a general principle demonstrating that by partitioning the feasible set, the duality gap, existing between a nonconvex program and its lagrangian dual, can be reduced, and in important special cases, even eliminated. The principle can be implemented in a Branch and Bound algorithm which computes an approximate global solution and a corresponding lower bound on the global optimal value. The algorithm involves decomposition and a nonsmooth local search. Numerical results for applying the algorithm to the pooling problem in oil refineries are given.Research supported by Shell Laboratorium, Amsterdam, and GIF—The German—Israel Foundation for Scientific Research and Development.     

Extending Scope of Robust Optimization: Comprehensive Robust Counterparts of Uncertain Problems

In this paper, we propose a new methodology for handling optimization problems with uncertain data. With the usual Robust Optimization paradigm, one looks for the decisions ensuring a required performance for all realizations of the data from a given bounded uncertainty set, whereas with the proposed approach, we require also a controlled deterioration in performance when the data is outside the uncertainty set. The extension of Robust Optimization methodology developed in this paper opens up new possibilities to solve efficiently multi-stage finite-horizon uncertain optimization problems, in particular, to analyze and to synthesize linear controllers for discrete time dynamical systems. Research was supported by the Binational Science Foundation grant #2002038