Supercapacitor study of reduced graphene oxide/Zn nanoparticle/polycarbazole electrode active materials and equivalent circuit models

Journal of Solid State Electrochemistry - In this study, graphene oxide (GO) was chemically reacted with sodium borohydride (NaBH4) to form reduced graphene oxide (rGO). rGO and rGO/Zn...     

Tryptamine derived amides with thiazole ring system from Thermoactinomyces strain TA66-2

A moderately thermophilic actinomycete strain, which was identified as Thermoactinomyces strain TA66-2, was isolated from hot-spring water. Fermentation, followed by solvent partition and chromatographic separations, resulted in the isolation of two new and two known molecules. The structures of the new compounds were elucidated as 2-(1-Propionylaminoethyl)thiazole-4-carboxylic acid [2-(1H-indol-3-yl)ethyl]amide and 2-(1-Acetylaminoethyl)thiazole-4-carboxylic acid [2-(1H-indol-3-yl)-ethyl]amide by using spectral methods (1D-, 2D-NMR and LC-ESI-MS).     

Comparative evaluation of various total antioxidant capacity assays applied to phenolic compounds with the CUPRAC assay

It would be desirable to establish and standardize methods that can measure the total antioxidant capacity level directly from vegetable extracts containing phenolics. Antioxidant capacity assays may be broadly classified as electron transfer (ET)- and hydrogen atom transfer (HAT)-based assays. The majority of HAT assays are kinetics-based, and involve a competitive reaction scheme in which antioxidant and substrate compete for peroxyl radicals thermally generated through the decomposition of azo compounds. ET-based assays measure the capacity of an antioxidant in the reduction of an oxidant, which changes colour when reduced. ET assays include the ABTS/TEAC, CUPRAC, DPPH, Folin-Ciocalteu and FRAP methods, each using different chromogenic redox reagents with different standard potentials. This review intends to offer a critical evaluation of existing antioxidant assays applied to phenolics, and reports the development by our research group of a simple and low-cost antioxidant capacity assay for dietary polyphenols, vitamins C and E, and human serum antioxidants, utilizing the copper(II)-neocuproine reagent as the chromogenic oxidizing agent, which we haved named the CUPRAC (cupric ion reducing antioxidant capacity) method. This method offers distinct advantages over other ET-based assays, namely the selection of working pH at physiological pH (as opposed to the Folin and FRAP methods, which work at alkaline and acidic pHs, respectively), applicability to both hydrophilic and lipophilic antioxidants (unlike Folin and DPPH), completion of the redox reactions for most common flavonoids (unlike FRAP), selective oxidation of antioxidant compounds without affecting sugars and citric acid commonly contained in foodstuffs and the capability to assay -SH bearing antioxidants (unlike FRAP). Other similar ET-based antioxidant assays that we have developed or modified for phenolics are the Fe(III)- and Ce(IV)-reducing capacity methods.     

Technology for developing databases of information systems

The problem of the creation of the needed technology allowing the effective development of corporate databases is considered. As a solution, we propose a new technology based on the “object-event” semantic model and the use of the universal data model, data model language, and special database software development tools. The principal features of the proposed technology and its advantages are considered.     

Characteristics of microemulsion polymerized styrene with water-soluble versus oil-soluble initiators

The effect of oil-soluble versus water-soluble free-radical generators in the polymerization of styrene in oil-in-water (O/W) micromulsions were investigated by photon correlation spectroscopy. The microemulsions were formed by styrene, brine, sodium dodecyl sulfate (SDS), and pentanol. The polymerizations were carried out in two microemulsions that contained droplets differing by a factor of 2.4 in volume. Under the conditions of ? = 0.019 and NaCl/SDS > 2 the microemulsions were stable and the droplets were independent of one another. Both oil-soluble and water-soluble initiators produced polystyrene that contained fractions of two different sizes. In the case of the oil-soluble initiator the droplet size in the microemulsion seemed to be correlated to the size of the product whereas in the case of the water-soluble initiator, there seemed to be little relation.     

The diamagnetic susceptibilities of donors in quantum wells with anisotropic effective mass

The diamagnetic susceptibility of a hydrogenic donor placed in Si, Ge and GaAs quantum wells with infinite confinement potential which have different effective mass anisotropy parameters (γ=_m⊥/_m∥$\gamma =m_{\perp }/m_{\parallel }$) has been investigated as a function of the well sizes. The binding energies of the donor have also been computed using a trial wave function with two parameters in the framework of the effective mass approximation. It has been observed that the diamagnetic susceptibility of the donor in the anisotropic materials converges rapidly to the bulk limit as the well size increases.