Antibacterial effect of silver nanoparticles deposited on corona‐treated polyester and polyamide fabrics

The possibility of using a corona treatment (electrical discharge at atmospheric pressure) for fiber surface activation, which can facilitate the loading of silver nanoparticles (NPs) from colloids onto the polyester (PES) and polyamide (PA) fabrics and thus improve their antibacterial properties, was studied. Bactericidal efficiency and its laundering durability on silver‐loaded fabrics for Gram‐positive bacterium Staphylococcus aureus and Gram‐negative bacterium Escherichia coli were evaluated. The fiber morphology after corona treatment and subsequent loading of silver NPs was followed by SEM. Corona‐treated fabrics loaded with silver NPs exhibited better antibacterial properties in comparison with untreated fabrics. In order to obtain acceptable laundering durability, it is necessary to use highly concentrated silver colloids. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Determination of competitive adsorption isotherms applying the nonlinear frequency response method: Part II. Experimental demonstration

This paper demonstrates an experimental application of the nonlinear frequency response (FR) method extension to determine adsorption isotherms of binary mixtures. This method, based on the analysis of the response of a chromatographic column subjected to the sinusoidal inlet concentration changes, is shown to be an alternative for isotherm determination. The critical issue related to the successful application of the method is to reach experimentally the low frequency asymptotic behaviour of the corresponding frequency response functions (FRFs). Although, there are different possibilities to perform periodical inlet concentration changes, in this paper only simultaneous changes for both components were considered. The adsorption of phenol and 2-phenylethanol on octadecyl silica was analyzed experimentally using a mixture of methanol and water as a solvent. Parameters of competitive isotherms were also estimated for comparison using the classical perturbation method. Despite certain differences between competitive isotherms estimated with the two methods that were found, the obtained results show the potential of the nonlinear FR method for measuring competitive isotherms.     

On the sum of powers of Laplacian eigenvalues of bipartite graphs

For a bipartite graph G and a non-zero real α, we give bounds for the sum of the αth powers of the Laplacian eigenvalues of G using the sum of the squares of degrees, from which lower and upper bounds for the incidence energy, and lower bounds for the Kirchhoff index and the Laplacian Estrada index are deduced.     

On derivative estimation and the solution of least squares problems

Surface interpolation finds application in many aspects of science and technology. Two specific areas of interest are surface reconstruction techniques for plant architecture and approximating cell face fluxes in the finite volume discretisation strategy for solving partial differential equations numerically. An important requirement of both applications is accurate local gradient estimation. In surface reconstruction this gradient information is used to increase the accuracy of the local interpolant, while in the finite volume framework accurate gradient information is essential to ensure second order spatial accuracy of the discretisation.     

The protection of Nifedipin from photodegradation due to complex formation with β-cyclodextrin

The inclusion complex β-cyclodextrin:nifedipin was prepared in solid state by coprecipitation with 1:1 mol ratio. The structure of the obtained complex and nifedipin was characterized by use of X-ray diffraction (XR), infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR), and differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) methods. The photodegradation of nifedipin and the β-cyclodextrin:nifedipin inclusion complex in solid state was monitored under natural daylight by infrared spectroscopy, whereby the free nifedipin degraded four to five times faster than the complexed nifedipin. The photodegradation products of both free and complexed nifedipin, formed during irradiation at 350 nm (with corresponding energy flux of 18 W m⁻²) were monitored by liquid chromatography during various time intervals. The speed of formation of nitroso- and nitro-phenyl derivatives by nifedipin irradiation was significantly higher than those of complexed nifedipin irradiation, which indicates its increased photostability in the inclusion complex. The effect on this property is significant because it contributes both to the improvement of the therapeutic effect of nifedipin and to the safer application thereof.      

The natural product content of the selected Cabernet Franc wine samples originating from Serbia: a case study of phenolics

This work aimed to evaluate the content of selected phenolic natural products in the wine samples made of three new Serbian Cabernet Franc clones (Nos. 02, 010 and 012, respectively) and mother vine (used as the relevant standard) during the period 2008–2012. Compared with all other wine samples, the Cabernet Franc wine of the clone No. 010 was found to have the highest total content of polyphenolics (1.85 ± 0.02 g/L) and anthocyanins (178.55 ± 3.75 mg/L). In addition, its Folin–Ciocalteu index (36.86 ± 0.12) stood out among the examined samples. Finally, the same wine was enriched with ellagic and gallic acids (3.44 ± 0.29 and 27.46 ± 0.21 mg/L, respectively), catechin (135.16 ± 6.47 mg/L) and epicatechin (51.33 ± 2.33 mg/L), the natural products known to exert significant lipid-lowering effects. Taken all together, the clone No. 010 developed in Serbia may offer new Cabernet Franc wine with geographical indication.     

Determination of metal traces in wine by argon stabilized d.c. arc

A spetroscopic method for the determination of metal traces (Mn, Cu, Fe) in wine has been developed based on argon stabilized d.c. arc plasma at atmospheric pressure. The experimental conditions were optimized using lateral distributions of spectral line intensities of the trace elements in aqueous and ethanol-aqueous solutions. The method was applied to the analysis of 6 wines from 3 Serbian wine-growing regions. Direct and standard addition methods were tested. The precision of the method is characterized by a relative standard deviation of 0.50– 3.00%. The accuracy of the method was assessed by flame AAS.     

Safe convergence of simultaneous methods for polynomial zeros

The theory of point estimation treating the initial conditions for the safe convergence of iterative processes for the simultaneous determination of polynomial zeros is considered. A general approach which makes use of corrections appearing in iterative formulas is given and demonstrated in the case of three well known methods without derivatives and based on Weierstrass’ corrections. The established convergence conditions are of practical importance since they depend only on available data: coefficients of a polynomial and initial approximations to the zeros. This revised version was published online in June 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.