Novel route to synthesis of allyl starch and biodegradable hydrogel by copolymerizing allyl‐modified starch with methacrylic acid and acrylamide

Maize starch was modified by allyl chloride adopting an interfacial reaction technique with cetyltrimethyl ammonium bromide as a phase‐transfer catalyst and pyridine as an acid acceptor. The degree of substitution was determined from an increasing carbon content of the modified starch. The percentage of carbon and hydrogen of the allyl‐modified starch was estimated by elemental analysis (C, H, and N), and the product characterization was done through ¹H NMR and ¹³C NMR analyses. The allyl‐modified starch was then copolymerized with methacrylic acid and a combination of methacrylic acid and acrylamide at 50 and 70 °C with potassium persulfate as an initiator. The copolymer thus formed swelled in distilled water after neutralization with sodium carbonate. The percentage of absorption capacity of the hydrogels was determined with distilled water and 0.9% NaCl solution. The highest percentage of absorption, 6500%, was achieved for the developed hydrogel containing allyl starch and acrylic monomer in a 1.7:1 w/w ratio and acrylic monomer, namely, methacrylic acid and acrylamide in a 3.2:1 w/w ratio. The study on biodegradability of the developed hydrogel showed that the hydrogel is degradable in the presence of diastase (amylase). © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Polym Sci Part A: Polym Chem 41: 1650–1658, 2003     

Determination of the rheological behavior of epoxy–amine thermosets by dynamic mechanical analysis: Isothermal methods versus nonisothermal methods

The reticulation process of an epoxy resin using an amine as a cure agent was studied at different temperatures and concentrations of the cure agent with dynamic mechanical thermal analysis. The study was performed under both isothermal and nonisothermal conditions, and a temperature–time–transformation diagram was obtained. The measurements from the two modes gave similar results, although the nonisothermal mode required fewer experiments. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Polym Sci Part B: Polym Phys 41: 1965–1977, 2003     

A Galois Connection

The connection presented in this paper mirror-links two metamathematical structures, the finitary closure operators, and the compact consistency properties, in such a way that a specification of one structure induces a provably equivalent specification of the other. Mathematics Subject Classification (2000): Primary 06A15, Secondary 28E10 03B22     

Triple differential cross sections for ionization of hydrogen atoms by positrons in a Schwinger variational calculation

Schwinger variational principle has been used to calculate triple differential cross-sections for ionization of hydrogen atoms by positrons at intermediate and high energies for Ehrhardt type asymmetric geometry. The results agree in general with the calculations of Brauneret al [8] and with the second Born calculation.     

ηi-Mode Related Properties of Collisionless Anisotropic Plasmas

An extended eigenvalue problem for collisionless electrostatic driftwaves in cylindrical and slab geometry is discussed and solved in local approximation. The fact of a minimum threshold for the ITG instability (η_i-mode) is used to get a unique concept for profile determination.     

Extension of multigrid methodology to supersonic/hypersonic 3-D viscous flows

A multigrid acceleration technique developed for solving the three-dimensional Navier–Stokes equations for subsonic/transonic flows has been extended to supersonic/hypersonic flows. An explicit multistage Runge–Kutta type of time-stepping scheme is used as the basic algorithm in conjunction with the multigrid scheme. Solutions have been obtained for a blunt conical frustum at Mach 6 to demonstrate the applicability of the multigrid scheme to high-speed flows. Computations have also been performed for a generic High-Speed Civil Transport configuration designed to cruise at Mach 3. These solutions demonstrate both the efficiency and accuracy of the present scheme for computing high-speed viscous flows over configurations of practical interest.     

Small Exotic Molecules with Bosonic Constituents

We study the stability and the properties of the ground state of neutral systems containing up to four positively charged bosons and their antiparticles. Examples are the di-pionium molecule (π ⁺ π ⁻)², which is almost identical to the positronium molecule (e ⁺ e ⁻)², the tri-pionium (π ⁺ π ⁻)³, and the quadri-pionium (π ⁺ π ⁻)⁴ molecules. We briefly compare our results on the energy to those on the large-N limit of (π ⁺ π ⁻) ^N . We also show that the annihilation probability can be calculated accurately with simple wave functions when one uses the generalized Schwinger rule. Received September 5, 1994; accepted for publication October 15, 1994     

Properties of levels in22Ne

Levels up to 9.3 MeV excitation in²²Ne were studied with the¹⁹ F(α, pγ) ²²Ne reaction atE _α = 12 MeV. Level energies, branching ratios, mean lifetimes, spins and mixing ratios were obtained for a number of levels. Relevant results are compared with many-particle shell-model calculations.     

A saxpy formulation for plane rotations

An algorithm for pre- or post-multiplication of a matrix by a plane rotation, using only three vector saxpy operations instead of the four vector operations usually considered necessary, is described. No auxiliary storage for overwriting is required. The method is shown to be numerically stable.