Structures and hardness of ethyl halides and ethyl tosylate

Ab initio calculations (RHF) of EtX molecules (X=F, Cl, Br, I, or OTs) were carried out with the use of different basis sets. Total charges on the atoms in the compounds under study were determined by Mulliken's, NPA, and Bader's methods, and a comparison of these values was performed. For all EtX compounds, a topological analysis of the electron density was carried out within the framework of Bader's theory, and the global and relative local hardnesses of the above-mentioned ethylating agents were estimated. Translated fromIzvestiya Akademii Nauk. Seriya Khimicheskaya, No. 4, pp. 608–612, April, 1998.     

Detection of stress whitening in plastics with the help of X-ray dark field imaging

The processing of thermoplastics can induce a wide range of defects such as stress whitening, cavitation and porosity, which can adversely affect the reliability of the final products. Hence, fast and effective non-destructive detection methods for such defects are highly important for quality assurance on production lines. In this paper, X-ray dark field imaging is presented as a new non-destructive testing method that allows the visualization of stress whitening or cavitation efficiently. The performance of the method is demonstrated for the case of an injection-moulded polyvinylidene fluoride part that exhibits stress whitening. Whereas the stress whitening could not be detected by conventional X-ray imaging, it was localized by an X-ray dark field image acquired within a few minutes. Once the precise location of the stress whitening was known, it was possible to verify the result by local micro X-ray computed tomography and by a micro section image.     

Roadside Drug Testing Approaches

The purpose of this review is to present an overview of roadside drug testing, driving enforcement, and drunk/drug driving detection around the world. Drunk and drug driving is a severe problem, not only in the UAE, but also around the world. This has important implications for road safety as drunk or drug driving may increase the chances of a driver’s involvement in a road crash when compared to a drug-free driver. Recently, due to increases in drug-impaired drivers’ crash involvement, many mobile roadside drug testing devices have been introduced to the market. These devices use oral fluid, urine or blood matrices. These are on-the-spot tests, which are easy to use and are applied by law enforcement agencies and the public. Law enforcement agencies most commonly use oral fluid to detect the presence of illicit drugs in drivers. This review discusses all the available devices in the market used by the authorities. It also describes the type of drugs widely abused by drivers along with behavioral testing methods. The different types of matrices used for roadside drug testing are also evaluated. Sample collection, storage, and pre-treatment methods are discussed, followed by the confirmatory analysis of positive samples. This article will significantly help law enforcement agencies compare and evaluate all the reliable roadside testing devices and new emerging confirmatory devices available to them in the market. This will help them make an informed decision on which device to adapt to their individual needs.     

Structure-Property Dependence of Copolymers Prepared by Cationic Polymerization

α-Methylstyrene/isobutene, α-methylstyrene/diisobutene, cyclopentadiene/isobutene, and cyclopentadiene/α-methylstyrene were copolymerized by cationic polymerization techniques. Several properties of the copolymers such as softening ranges and oxidation stability depend on their constitutional composition, and were controlled by variation of the conditions of their synthesis.     

Capillary liquid chromatography as a tool for separation of hydrophobic basic drugs. Relation between tests for column characterization and real analysis

Two capillary columns for reversed phase (RP) capillary liquid chromatography (CLC), viz. Nucleosil 100‐5 C18 and LiChrosorb RP‐select B, were characterized by the Walters test, i.e. the chromatographic test proposed for RP stationary phases. Hydrophobicity indices were determined not only in acetonitrile/water mobile phase, as proposed in the test, but they were also measured in buffered systems. This approach was used to quantify the influence of mobile phase composition on the modification of the surface of the stationary phases. In the next step, small basic compounds differing in their hydrophobicity and basicity were selected and their retention on the stationary phases in mobile phases of the same composition as used for column testing was examined. Furthermore, the retention of newly synthesized drugs, chemotherapeutics derived from thioacridine and pyridoquinoline, differing in their structures, basicity, and hydrophobicity, was also studied. The composition of the mobile phases had to be shifted to higher contents of organic modifiers – acetonitrile or methanol – in order to elute these hydrophobic compounds from the columns. The question we wanted to answer was: How is the method for testing of reversed phases related to retention, separation efficiency, and peak symmetry of various analytes?     

Multivariate analysis of non-homogeneous peaks in liquid chromatography

Summary The effects of concentration, separation and spectral similarity as factors influencing the accuracy of iterative target testing factor analysis (ITT-FA) are investigated for three component systems by the application of analysis of variance (ANOVAR). ANOVAR is applied over a range of peak separations to map the changing effects of the three factors with increasing overlap. Two error responses were measured and analysed, (a) Relative cluster error (RCE) a measure of the error over all peaks in a cluster and (b) Relative peak error (RPE) the error of an individual peak. Multicomponent analysis (MCA) a method requiringa priori spectral information, is used as a referee method for ITT-FA.     

Tribo-corrosion behavior of Zn-Ni-Cu and Zn-Ni-Cu-TiB2 coated mild steel

In this investigation , Zn-Ni-Cu and Zn-Ni-Cu-TiB₂ were coated on a mild steel specimen using a high velocity oxy fuel thermal spray (HVOF) process. The surface morphology and coated powder distribution of coated specimens were characterized using scanning electron microscope (SEM), energy dispersive spectroscopy (EDS), and X-ray-Elemental mapping. The pin-on-disc (ASTM G99-17) method was used to examine the wear resistance of the coated and uncoated mild steel specimens. Both coated Zn-Ni-Cu and Zn-Ni-Cu-TiB2 on mild steel saw reduced wear volume loss than uncoated mild steel. The coated samples of Zn-Ni-Cu and Zn-Ni-Cu-TiB2 on Mild Steel were put through a scratch test to determine the adhesion strength of the coating with the substrate. The adhesion strength of coated Zn-Ni-Cu and Zn-Ni-Cu TiB2 mild steel was higher than that of untreated mild steel, indicating a solid link between the coating and substrate and minimal delamination. Using the Vickers hardness test to measure the hardness caused by the coating, it was shown that coated samples of Zn-Ni-Cu and Zn-Ni-Cu-TiB2 coated mild steel had significantly higher hardness than uncoated mild steel. Using ASTM G1-03 and ASTM G-31 standards, a 0.2 M HCl immersion cycle test was conducted for 28 days to test the corrosion resistance of coatings in an acidic media (672Hrs). When compared to Zn-Ni-Cu and Zn-Ni-Cu-TiB2 coated mild steel, the weight loss for the uncoated mild steel was significantly larger. Additionally, XRD examination showed that coated samples had less rust on their surface than uncoated samples. Both Zn-Ni-Cu and Zn-Ni-Cu-TiB2 on Mild Steel were anti-corrosive, as evidenced by increased corrosion potential and reduced corrosion current density when compared to uncoated mild steel, according to electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS)/Tafel study in 0.2 MHCl. The outcomes of each test were very encouraging and demonstrated the durability of these coatings against wear and corrosion.     

Recent advances in the development of colorimetric analysis and testing based on aggregation-induced nanozymes

Colorimetric sensing strategies as a powerful point-of-care testing(POCT) tool have attracted significant interest in various chem/biosensing applications.Taking the excellent bare-eye-detectable signaling feature,nanozymes-based colorimetric sensors enable more potential applications and have been a new forefront in the colorimetric POCT analysis toward different target analytes.However,the low catalytic activity of nanozymes in most cases limits their practical application.Recent efforts demonstrate that the aggregation-induced nanozymes provide a general means to modulate nanozymes activity and enhance colorimetric sensing performances of some nanozymes-based colorimetric sensors.But there are few reports are explored to discuss and review such aggregation-induced nanozymes and their colorimetric sensing applications.To highlight the advances and progress in aggregation-induced nanozymes based colorimetric assays,we herein summary the fundamentals,classify and applications of this newlydeveloping field,focusing on the aggregation-induced activity enhancement of nanozymes(AIAEnanozymes) with a significant "signal-on" feature and aggregation-induced activity inhibition of nanozymes(AIAI-nanozymes) with a dramatical "signal-of" characteristics.Finally,we also propose the current challenges and the future prospects on both AIAE-nanozymes and AIAI-nanozymes.     

毒品与化学*

毒品与化学的种种纠葛在2018年中国毒品形势报告中得到了淋漓尽致的体现,因此为做好禁毒工作,必须厘清化学与毒品的关系。从为什么毒品是化学品(毒品的本质),毒品检验和识别,毒品成瘾的本质,由传统毒品到新型毒品的转变等4个方面系统阐述毒品与化学的关系。