High-Yield Synthesis of Gold Microplates Using Amphiphilic Block Copolymers: Are Lyotropic Liquid Crystals Required?

Summary : High-yield synthesis of gold microplates is achieved through autoreduction of hydrogen tetrachloroaureate (III) hydrate (HAuCl₄ · 3H₂O) in aqueous solutions of poly(ethylene oxide)-poly(propylene oxide)-poly(ethylene oxide) block copolymer (Pluronic L64, EO₁₃PO₃₀EO₁₃) at ambient conditions, in the absence of added energy, reductant, or other surfactants. The formation by the amphiphilic block copolymer of lyotropic liquid crystals (e.g., ordered cylindrical/hexagonal or lamellar phases) is not required for templating the formation of such microplates.     

Cellulose dissolution: insights on the contributions of solvent-induced decrystallization and chain disentanglement

The dissolution of cellulose is a critical step for the efficient utilization of this renewable resource as a starting material for the synthesis of high value-added functional polymers and chemicals and also for biofuel production. The recalcitrance of semicrystalline cellulose microfibrils presents a major barrier to cellulose dissolution. Despite research efforts, important aspects of cellulose dissolution such as solvent-induced decrystallization and chain disentanglement are not well-understood. Here we address these fundamental issues with the practical goal of gaining insights into the swelling and dissolution of cellulose that cannot be obtained from macroscopic experimental data. To this end, we have used a newly-developed phenomenological model that captures the phenomena governing the dissolution of semicrystalline polymers as well as the thermodynamics and kinetics of dissolution. This model fits well experimental data for swelling and dissolution of cotton fibers in the ionic liquid [bmim]Cl, and allows the quantification of two important aspects, i.e., solvent effectiveness in cellulose (1) decrystallization and (2) chain disentanglement, the balance of which controls the mechanism and kinetics of cellulose dissolution. The activation parameters of cellulose decrystallization, estimated using the obtained decrystallization constant values, reveal that the decrystallization of cellulose in [bmim]Cl is associated with positive enthalpy and entropy and it is also very sensitive to temperature. When the solvent effectiveness in the disruption of cellulose crystals is relatively lower than its ability to disentangle the chains, the kinetics of dissolution are controlled by decrystallization. Furthermore, conditions that facilitate cellulose chain disentanglement, in addition to increasing the rate of dissolution, can result in faster decrystallization. The solvent effectiveness in chain disentanglement is the only factor that determines the decrease of the cellulose fiber radius. In cases where the fiber dissolution rate is lower than the decrystallization rate, the dissolution of cellulose is mostly controlled by the solvent ability to disentangle the chains. The insights obtained from this study improve the understanding of cellulose–solvent interactions underlying decrystallization and disentanglement and their contributions in controlling the kinetics of cellulose swelling and dissolution.     

A tri-Hamiltonian formulation of the full Kostant-Toda lattice

We define Poisson structures which lead to a tri-Hamiltonian formulation for the full Kostant-Toda lattice. In addition, a hierarchy of vector fields called master symmetries are constructed and they are used to generate the nonlinear Poisson brackets and other invariants. Various deformation relations are investigated. The results are analogous to results for the finite nonperiodic Toda lattice.     

Hardening rules for finite deformation micropolar plasticity: Restrictions imposed by the second law of thermodynamics and the postulate of Il'iushin

Received April 9, 2001 / Published online August 16, 2001     

On the asymptotic behavior of nonlinear waves in the presence of a short-range potential

Consider the nonlinear wave equation with zero mass and a time-independent potential in three space dimensions. When it comes to the associated Cauchy problem, it is already known that short-range potentials do not affect the existence of small-amplitude solutions. In this paper, we focus on the associated scattering problem and we show that the situation is quite different there. In particular, we show that even arbitrarily small and rapidly decaying potentials may affect the asymptotic behavior of solutions.     

Solitons via Lie-Bäcklund transformation for 5D low-energy string theory

We apply a non-linear matrix transformation of Lie-Bäcklund type on a seed soliton configuration in order to obtain a new solitonic solution in the framework of the 5D low-energy effective field theory of the bosonic string. The seed solution represents a stationary axisymmetric two-soliton configuration previously constructed through the inverse scattering method and consists of a massless gravitational field coupled to a non-trivial chargeless dilaton and to an axion field endowed with charge. We apply a fully parameterized non-linear matrix transformation of Ehlers type on this massless solution and get a massive rotating axisymmetric gravitational soliton coupled to charged axion and dilaton fields. We discuss on some physical properties of both the initial and the generated solitons and fully clarify the physical effect of the non-linear normalized Ehlers transformation on the seed solution.