Electrochemical performance of catalyst couples M/stainless steel 430 (M: Ni,Co, and Cu) for the hydrogen production in KOH electrolyte

Journal of Solid State Electrochemistry - In this work, three catalysts (nickel, cobalt, copper) are electrochemically deposited on stainless steel substrates AISI 430 and their performances as...     

N,N′-Ethylenebisstearamide Additive in Intravaginal Drug Delivery Device Determined by NP-LC with ELSD

A new method for N,N′-ethylenebisstearamide analysis was developed and validated in NP-LC with evaporative light scattering detection for EBS content in drug delivery device. Chromatographic conditions were silica column 250 × 3 mm at 45 °C with 94:6 CHCl₃/ethanol at 0.5 mL min^?1. The retention time of N,N′-ethylenebisstearamide was 4.35 min. The method was fully validated by applying a novel strategy using accuracy profiles. The EBS content in the progesterone device was established after administration in animal which proved that such additives did not migrate into the animal.     

Potassium Fluoride on Alumina: One-Pot Synthesis of N-Allyl Trichloroacetamides by Cascade Condensation-Sigmatropic Rearrangement

Allyl alcohols adsorbed on Al₂O₃-KF at room temperature reacted with trichloroacetonitrile and gave rearranged trichloroacetamides at room temperature, in one pot reaction.     

Highly sensitive modified glassy carbon sensor based on TDAN for nitrate detection in real water

Glassy carbon electrodes modified with a plasticized PVC membrane including tetradodecyl ammonium nitrate (TDAN) and two different plasticizers [bis(2-etheylhexyl) sebacate (DOS) and dibutyl phthalate (DBP)]. TDAN is a quaternary ammonium salt, used in nitrate-selective field-effect transistor membrane, and it is applied as an ionophore for sensor development. Membranes were prepared as sensing matrix for nitrate detection through the intensity of its reduction peak using cyclic voltammetry. Under optimum conditions, the detection limits of nitrate obtained with TDAN + DOS and TDAN + DBP, are 10–6 mol/dm3 and 10–9 mol/dm3, respectively. As a result, the developed sensors based on TDAN + DOS and TDAN + DBP matrices demonstrate satisfactory quantified amounts in determination of nitrate in water where the measured values were less than 0.57 × 10–7 mol/dm3 and 0.73 × 10–10 mol/dm3, respectively.     

EDXRF analysis of suspended particulate matter (SPM) from residential and industrial areas in Cairo,Egypt

Due to the remarkable increasing of the mass concentrations of suspended particulate matter (SPM) as an air pollution indicator in Greater Cairo‐Egypt, regular sampling during autumn 2014 and winter 2014/2015 seasons has been performed from industrial and residential areas. It was found that the average mass concentrations of the SPM collected from residential and industrial areas are equal to 531 ± 198 and 912 ± 230 μg/m³, respectively. These quantities are much higher than the maximum allowance level, especially for the industrial area. By utilizing three secondary targets, energy dispersive x‐ray fluorescence working under vacuum environment was used for elemental analysis of 19 elements namely; Na, Al, Si, S, Cl, K, Ca, Ti, V, Mn, Fe, Ni, Cu, Zn, Pb, Se, Br, Rb, and Sr. The present optimized selective excitation energy dispersive x‐ray fluorescence analysis has considerably enhanced the analytical range with respect to our previous similar studies, including low Z elements such as Na, Al, S, and Cl and attaining lower detection limits in the range of ng/m³. Remarkable high elemental concentrations were determined for most of the detected elements from the industrial area samples, strongly indicating the influence of the industrial and anthropogenic activities. The average percentages of the mass concentration of the detected inorganic elements account only for 3.2% and 10.5% of the total mass concentration collected from the residential and industrial areas, respectively, thus directly indicating that the content of organic pollutants in SPM is the dominant contribution.     

Lead speciation of PM2.5 collected from Greater Cairo,Egypt and Zarqa,Jordan: An energy dispersive X-ray fluorescence and X-ray absorption near edge structure study

Fine aerosol particles with an aerodynamic diameter equal or less than 2.5 μm (PM_2.5) have been collected from two sites (residential and industrial) in Greater Cairo, Egypt and one site in Zarqa, Jordan. Based on the elemental quantitative analysis of PM_2.5 using energy dispersive X-ray fluorescence with Mo secondary target, Pb concentrations increased remarkably during winter season regardless of the sampling location. Moreover, it reached the maximum concentration at the industrial location of Greater Cairo, Egypt, and it equals 415 ± 485 ng/m³. The remarkable high standard deviation is due to the significant variation of Pb concentration from time to time during that winter season. Depending on the energy dispersive X-ray fluorescence results, specific PM_2.5 samples that have the highest concentration of Pb (two samples/location) have been selected for the X-ray absorption near edge structure measurements to estimate the oxidation state of Pb species. The X-ray absorption near edge structure measurements including 13 Pb references have been carried out at Pb-L₃ absorption edge (13.039 keV) using fluorescence mode. It was shown that PM_2.5 contains divalent and tetravalent lead in both industrial site in Greater Cairo, Egypt and urban site of Zarqa, Jordan although that of a residential area of Greater Cairo-Egypt is almost divalent lead.     

Existence Results on the Second-Order Nonconvex Sweeping Processes with Perturbations

We prove several existence theorems for second-order differential inclusions of the form , when K and F are two convex or nonconvex set-valued mappings taking their values in a Hilbert space.     

Bare Histidine–Serine Models: Implication and Impact of Hydrogen Bonding on Nucleophilicity

A new family of 2‐hydroxyalk(en/yn)ylimidazoles has been evaluated as serine–histidine bare dyad models for the ring‐opening reaction of L ‐lacOCA, a cyclic O‐carboxyanhydride. These models were selected to unravel the implication of intramolecular hydrogen bonding and to substantiate its influence on the nucleophilicity of the alcohol moiety, as it is suspected to occur in enzyme active sites. Although designed to exclusively facilitate the preliminary step of proton transfer during the studied ring‐opening reaction, these minimalistic models depicted a measureable increase in reactivity relative to the isolated fragments. A couple of reliable experimental and theoretical methods have been developed to readily monitor the strength of the intramolecular hydrogen bond in dilute solution. Results show that the folded conformers are the most nucleophilic species because of the intramolecular hydrogen bond.     

Structural,electronic, optical and thermodynamic properties of NaxRb1−xH and NaxK1−xH alloys

A theoretical study of the structural, electronic, optical and thermodynamic properties of Na_xRb_1?xH and Na_xK_1?xH ternary alloys in NaCl phase has been carried out using the first-principles method. We modeled the alloys at some selected compositions with ordered structures described in terms of periodically repeated supercells. The dependences on the composition of the lattice constant, band gap, dielectric constant, refractive index, Debye temperature, mixing entropy and heat capacities were analyzed for x=0, 0.25, 0.50, 0.75 and 1. The lattice constants of Na_xRb_1?xH and Na_xK_1?xH exhibit a marginal deviation from Vegard's law. A strong deviation of the bulk modulus from linear concentration dependence was observed for both alloys. We found that the composition dependence of the energy band gap is highly non linear and the large bowing coefficient for Na_xRb_1?xH is sensitive to the composition. Using the approach of Zunger and co-workers, the microscopic origins of the gap bowing were detailed and explained. The thermodynamic stability of these alloys was investigated by calculating the phase diagram. The thermal effect on some macroscopic properties was investigated using the quasi-harmonic Debye model. There is a good agreement between our results and the available experimental data for the binary compounds, which is a support for those of the ternary alloys that we report for the first time.